CITIES  AND  SEA-COASTS 
AND  ISLANDS 


BY  THE  SAME   WRITER 


Figures  of  Several  Centuries.    1916. 

Poems  (Collected  Edition  in  two  volumes).     1902. 

The  Symbolist  Movement  in  Literature.    1899. 

Cities.    1903. 

Spiritual  Adventures.    1905. 

Studies  in  Seven  Arts.    1906. 


CITIES   AND 

SEA-COASTS    AND 

ISLANDS 


BY 


ARTHUR   SYMONS 

AUTHOR   OF    "TRISTIAN    AND    ISEULT,"    EtC. 


NEW  YORK 

BRENTANO'S 
1919 


Copyright,  1918,  by  Brentano's 


The   Plimpton   Prr^s.   Norwood.    }fass.,    Tf.  S.  A. 


TO 

AUGUSTUS  JOHN 


465383 

LIBRARY 


Contents. 

I.   Spain  : 

Seville 3 

The  Painters  of  Seville 24 

Domenico  Theotocopuli :    A   Study   at 

Toledo 49 

The  Poetry  of  Santa  Teresa  and  San 

Juan  de  la  Cruz 64 

Campoamor 82 

A  Spanish  Poet :   Nunez  de  Arce.      .    .  94 

Moorish  Secrets  in  Spain 100 

Valencia 106 

Tarragona 114 

Cordova 119 

Montserrat: 122 

Cadiz 127 

A  Bull  Fight  at  Valencia  : 131 

Alicante 138 

A  Spanish  Music-Hall 145 

II.    London:  A  Book  of  Aspects 159 

III.    Sea-Coasts  and  Islands  : 

Dieppe,  1895 227 

A  Valley  in  Cornwall 249 

vii 


Contents 


At  the  Land's  End 265 

Cornish  Sketches 274 

In  a  Northern  Bay 295 

Winchelsea  :  An  Aspect 298 

The  Islands  of  Aran 302 

In  SHgo  :    Rosses  Point  and  Glencar.    .  328 

From  a  Castle  in  Ireland 340 

Dover  Cliffs 345 


Vlll 


I. 

Spain. 


Seville. 


I. 


Seville,  more  than  any  city  I  have  ever  seen,  is  the 
city  of  pleasure.  It  is  not  languid  with  pleasure, 
Uke  Venice,  nor  flushed  with  hurrying  after  pleasure, 
Hke  Budapest ;  but  it  has  the  constant  brightness, 
blitheness,  and  animation  of  a  city  in  which  pleasure 
is  the  chief  end  of  existence,  and  an  end  easily 
attained,  by  simple  means  within  every  one's  reach. 
It  has  sunshine,  flowers,  an  expressive  river,  orange 
groves,  palm  trees,  broad  walks  leading  straight  into 
the  country,  beautiful,  ancient  buildings  in  its  midst, 
shining  white  houses,  patios  and  flat  roofs  and  vast 
windows,  everything  that  calls  one  into  the  open 
air,  and  brings  light  and  air  to  one,  and  thus  gives 
men  the  main  part  of  their  chances  of  natural 
fehcity.  And  it  has  the  theatres,  cafes,  shops,  of 
a  real  city,  it  is  not  provincial,  as  Valencia  is ;  it  is 
concentrated,  and  yet  filled  to  the  brim ;  it  has 
completely  mastered  its  own  resources.  Life  is 
everywhere ;  there  are  no  melancholy  gaps,  vacant 
spaces,  in  which  a  ruinous  old  age  has  its  own  way 
desolately,  as  in  most  really  picturesque  cities ;  as 
in  Venice,  for  instance,  which  it  resembles  in  so 
many  points.  It  has  room  for  itself,  and  it  is  not 
too  large  for  itself.  And  in  living  gaily,  and  in 
the  present,  it  is  carrying  on  a  tradition  :  it  is  the 
city  of  Don  Juan,  the  city  of  Figaro. 

I  am  coming,  more  and  more,  to  measure  the 
charm  of  cities,  at  all  events  their  desirability  for 
living  in,   by  the   standard   of  their   parks,   public 

3 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

gardens,  and  free  spaces  where  one  can  be  pleasantly 
unoccupied  in  the  open  air.  I  want  the  town,  not 
the  country,  but  I  want  the  town  to  give  me  the 
illusion  of  the  country,  as  well  as  its  own  char- 
acteristic qualities.  Rome  itself,  without  its  villas, 
even  Rome,  would  not  be  Rome ;  and  Seville,  which 
is  so  vividly  a  town,  and  with  so  many  of  a  town's 
good  qualities,  has  the  most  fehcitous  parks,  gardens, 
and  promenades  (with  that  one  great  exception)  that 
I  have  ever  found  in  a  city.  Gardens  follow  the 
river-side,  park  after  park,  and  every  afternoon 
Seville  walks  and  drives  and  sits  along  that  broad 
road  leading  so  straight  into  the  open  country, 
really  a  Paseo  de  las  Delicias,  a  road  of  trees  and 
sunlight.  Turn  to  the  right  or  to  the  left,  and  you 
are  in  a  quiet  shadow,  under  lanes  of  orange  trees 
and  alleys  of  acacias.  There  are  palms  and  there 
is  water,  and  there  are  little  quaint  seats  everywhere  ; 
paths  wind  in  and  out,  roses  are  growing  in  mid- 
winter, they  are  picking  the  oranges  as  they  ripen 
from  green  to  gold,  and  carrying  them  in  the  panniers 
of  donkeys,  and  pouring  them  in  bright  showers 
on  the  ground,  and  doing  them  up  into  boxes. 
Great  merchant  vessels  lie  against  the  river-side,  un- 
loading their  cargoes;  and  across  the  park,  on  the 
other  side  of  a  wall,  drums  are  beating,  bugles 
blowing,  and  the  green  meadow-grass  is  blue  and 
red  with  soldiers.  In  the  park,  girls  pass  wrapped 
in  their  shawls,  with  roses  in  their  hair,  grave  and 
laughing;  an  old  gardener,  in  his  worn  coat  with 
red  facings,  passes  slowly,  leaning  on  his  stick.  You 
4 


Seville. 

can  sit  here  for  hours,  In  a  warm  quiet,  and  with 
a  few  dry  leaves  drifting  about  your  feet,  to  remind 
you  that  it  is  winter. 

Seville  is  not  a  winter  city,  and  during  those 
months  it  seems  to  wait,  remembering  and  expectant, 
in  an  acquiescence  in  which  only  a  short  and  not 
uneasy  sleep  divides  summer  from  spring.  To  the 
northern  stranger,  its  days  of  sunshine  and  blue  sky 
seem  to  make  winter  hardly  more  than  a  name. 
Sun  and  air,  on  these  perfect  winter  afternoons,  have 
that  rare  quality  which  produces  what  I  should  like 
to  call  a  kind  of  active  languor.  The  sharpening 
of  a  breath,  and  it  would  become  chill ;  the  deepen- 
ing of  the  sunshine,  and  it  would  become  oppressive. 
And  just  this  difficult  equilibrium,  as  it  seems,  of 
the  forces  of  summer  and  winter,  adds  a  zest  to 
one's  contentment,  a  kind  of  thankfulness  which 
one  does  not  find  it  needful  to  feel  in  the  time  of 
summer.  How  delightful  to  sit,  perfectly  warm, 
under  a  tree  whose  leaves  are  scattered  about  the 
ground,  yellow  with  winter ;  to  watch  the  bare 
branches,  among  these  always  green  palms  and 
orange  trees,  remembering  winter  in  the  North. 

But  to  enjoy  sympathetically  all  that  Seville,  even 
in  winter,  can  be  to  its  own  people,  it  is  not  enough 
to  go  to  the  parks  and  the  Paseo ;  one  must  go,  on 
a  fine  Sunday  afternoon,  to  the  railway  fine  which 
stretches  onwards  from  the  Barqueta,  along  the 
river-side,  but  in  the  opposite  direction.  The  line 
is  black  with  people,  at  one  hour  going,  at  another 
hour  returning,  an  unending  stream  which  broadens 

5 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  scatters  on  both  sides,  along  the  brown  herbage 
by  the  river,  and  over  the  green  spaces  on  the 
landward  side.  At  intervals  there  is  a  little  venta, 
there  are  bowling-alleys,  swings,  barrel-organs,  con- 
certinas, the  sound  of  castanets,  people  dancing, 
the  clapping  of  hands,  the  cries  of  the  vendors  of 
water,  shell-fish,  and  chestnuts,  donkeys  passing 
with  whole  famihes  on  their  backs,  families  camping 
and  picnicking  on  the  grass,  and  everywhere  chairs, 
chairs  on  the  grass,  two  sitting  on  each  chair,  in  a 
circle  about  the  dancers,  as  they  dance  in  couples, 
alternately;  chairs  and  .tables  and  glasses  of  man- 
zanilla  about  the  ventas ;  and  always  the  slow 
movement  of  people  passing,  quietly  happy,  in  a 
sort  of  grave  enjoyment,  which  one  sees  in  their 
faces  when  they  dance.  Here  is  the  true  puehloy 
the  working-people,  cigarreras,  gipsies,  all  Triana 
and  the  Macarena ;  and  could  people  amuse  them- 
selves more  simply  or  more  quietly,  with  a  more 
enjoyable  decorum  ?  As  they  turn  homewards,  in 
another  long  black  line,  the  sun  is  setting;  a 
melancholy  splendour  burns  down  slowly  upon  the 
thin  trees  across  the  water,  staining  the  water  with 
faint  reflections,  and  touching  the  dreary,  colourless 
shrubs  along  the  river-side  with  delicate  autumn 
colours,  as  sunset  ends  the  day  of  the  people. 


II. 

There  are  seven  hundred  streets  in  Seville,  and 
there  is  hardly  a  street  which  has  not  some  personal 
6 


Seville. 

character  of  its  own,  or  which  does  not  add  one 
more  Hne  to  the  elaborate  arabesque  of  the  city. 
One  of  my  favourite  aspects,  for  it  is  an  aspect  from 
which  Seville  looks  most  Eastern,  is  at  just  that 
point  of  the  Paseo  de  Catalina  de  Rivera  where  it  is 
joined  by  the  Calle  San  Fernando.  One  sees  the 
battlemented  outer  wall  of  the  Alcazar,  with  its  low, 
square  towers,  the  Giralda,  the  brown  turrets  of 
two  or  three  churches,  and  then  nothing  but  white 
walls  and  brown  roofs,  with  a  few  bare  branches 
rising  here  and  there  delicately  against  the  sky, 
between  the  sharp,  irregular  lines  of  the  houses,  all 
outlined  in  bright  white.  One  can  fancy  a  whole 
Kremlin  or  Hradcin  clustered  inside  that  low, 
white,  battlemented  wall ;  outside  which  the  dreary 
Paseo,  and  the  dim  green  of  the  Prado  San  Sebastian, 
seem  to  be  already  the  country. 

And  it  is  from  this  point  too,  as  one  turns  home- 
ward from  the  river-side,  that  evening  seems  to  come 
on  most  delicately  :  those  sunsets  of  blue  and  rose 
and  gold,  as  the  sun  goes  down  across  the  Gua- 
dalquivir, and  that  rosy  flush  which  encircles  all 
Seville  after  the  sun  has  gone  down,  as  if  the  city 
lay  in  the  hollow  of  a  great  shell,  tinged  with  rose 
at  the  edges.  It  is  at  just  this  hour  that  Triana 
looks  its  best,  heaped  somewhat  irregularly  on  the 
other  bank,  in  a  long,  white  and  pink  line,  above 
the  brown  slime  ;  and  from  the  Triana  bridge,  always 
crowded  with  lean,  beaten  horses,  dragging  too 
heavy  loads,  and  lines  of  white  donkeys  with  panniers, 
nodding  their  jingling  heads,  as  they  wander  along 

7 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

by  themselves,  one  sees  the  whole  river,  and  the 
Moorish  Tower  of  Gold,  and  the  crowded  masts, 
changing  colour  as  the  light  changes  moment  by 
moment. 

The  streets  of  Seville  are  narrow,  for  shade  in 
the  summer  and  warmth  in  the  winter,  and  many 
of  them,  like  the  central  Calle  Sierpes,  with  its 
shops,  and  clubs,  and  cafes,  a  street  of  windows, 
are  closed  to  wheels.  Every  house  has  its  balconies, 
and  the  older  ones  their  barred  windows  on  the 
ground  floor;  and  every  house  has  its  patio,  that 
divine  invention  of  the  Moors,  meant,  certainly,  for 
a  summer  city,  and  meant,  as  one  sees  it  in  Morocco, 
for  houses  without  windows,  in  which  all  the  light 
comes  from  the  open  roof  above  an  inner  court. 
The  Spaniards  have  both  patios  and  windows,  for 
summer  and  winter,  in  their  wise,  characteristic 
passion  for  light.  All  the  doors,  leading  to  the 
patio,  are  of  open  iron-work,  no  two  doors  alike, 
in  their  surprisingly  varied,  and  often  exquisite, 
arabesques  of  pattern.  This  throwing  open  of  one's 
house  to  the  street,  yet  with  an  iron  door,  always 
closed,  setting  a  boundary  to  the  feet  if  not  to  the 
eyes,  seems  to  me  again  characteristic  of  these 
natural,  not  self-conscious  people,  who  seem  often 
so  careless  of  their  own  dignity  and  liberty,  and 
are  so  well  able  to  preserve  them. 

Seville  lights  up  for  a  feast-day  as  a  face  lights 
up  with  a  smile.  The  night  before  the  great  feast 
of  the  Immaculate  Conception,  I  went  into  the 
streets  to  find  the  whole  place  transformed,  glittering. 
8 


Seville. 

Crimson  or  white  and  blue  cloths  were  thrown  over 
balconies,  rows  of  lamps  and  candles  burned  above 
them,  and  between  the  Hghts  eager  faces  leaned 
over,  looking  down  at  the  eager  faces  looking  up 
at  them.  The  pubhc  squares  were  brilhant  with 
hght,  and  the  whole  place  became  suddenly  filled 
with  people,  passing  to  and  fro  in  the  Sierpes,  and 
along  the  streets  of  shops,  which  I  hardly  recognised, 
so  brilliantly  lighted  were  all  the  windows.  The 
transformation  seemed  to  have  been  done  in  a 
minute,  and  here  was  the  true  Seville,  idle,  eager, 
brilliant,  moving  gaily,  making  the  most  of  the 
world  on  the  Church's  terms  of  felicity  for  the 
other  world. 

And  yet  this,  if  the  true  Seville,  is  not  all  Seville, 
and  I  found  another,  silent,  almost  deserted  city, 
which  fascinated  me  almost  more  than  this  hving 
and  moving  one,  whenever  I  wandered  about  at 
night,  in  streets  that  sank  to  sleep  so  early,  and 
seemed  so  mysteriously  quiescent,  under  the  bright 
sky  and  the  stars.  Night  passed  rarely  without 
my  coming  out  of  some  narrow  street  upon  the  vast 
Plaza  del  Triunfo,  which  holds  the  Cathedral,  its 
Pagan  counterpart,  the  Giralda,  the  Alcazar,  and 
the  Lonja.  The  tall  tower  of  the  Giralda  was 
always  the  first  thing  I  saw,  rising  up,  hke  the 
embodied  forces  of  the  delicate  powers  of  the  world, 
by  the  side  of  the  Christian  Cathedral.  Seen  from 
the  proper  distance,  it  is  like  a  filigree  casket  that 
one  could  lift  in  the  hand,  as  Santa  Justa  and  Santa 
Rufina  lift  it,  in  Murillo's  picture ;    looking  up  from 

9 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

close  underneath  it,  it  is  like  a  great  wall  hiding 
the  stars.  And  the  Moors  have  done  needlework 
on  a  wall  as  solid  as  a  Roman  wall ;  far  finer  work 
than  that  bastard  splendour  of  the  Alcazar,  with  its 
flickering  lights,  and  illuminations  like  illuminations 
on  parchment. 

Looking  back  at  the  Giralda  and  the  Cathedral 
from  the  gateway  of  the  Patio  de  las  Banderas,  one 
sees  perhaps  the  finest  sight  in  Spain.  The  Giralda 
stands  motionless,  and  a  little  aloof;  but  by  its  side 
the  vast,  embattled  magnificence  of  the  Cathedral 
seems  to  change  in  every  aspect,  full  of  multiform 
life,  ordered  to  a  wonderfully  expressive  variety, 
throwing  out  new  shoots  in  every  direction,  hke  a 
tree  which  grows  into  a  forest  in  some  tropical 
country,  or  like  a  city  grouping  itself  about  a  citadel. 
It  is  full  of  the  romantic  spirit,  the  oriental  touch 
freeing  it  from  any  of  the  too  heavy  solemnity  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  and  suiting  it  to  a  Southern  sky. 
Above  all,  it  has  infinitely  varied  movement :  yes, 
as  it  seems  to  lean  slightly  from  the  perpendicular, 
all  this  vivid  mass  might  be  actually  about  to  mov^e, 
to  sail  away  like  a  great  ship,  with  all  its  masts  and 
spread  sails  and  corded  rigging. 

III. 

Much  of  what  is  most  characteristic  in  the  men 
of  Seville  may  be  studied  in  the  cafes,  which  are 
filled  every  evening  with  crowds  of  unoccupied 
persons,    who    in    every    other    country    would    be 

lO 


Seville. 

literally  of  the  working  class,  but  who  here  seem 
to  have  endless  leisure.  They  are  rough-looking, 
obviously  poor,  they  talk,  drink  coffee,  buy  news- 
papers and  lottery  tickets,  and  they  are  all  smoking. 
They  fill  rows  of  tables  with  little  companies  of 
friends  ;  they  are  roughly  good-humoured,  affection- 
ately friendly  with  one  another ;  and  their  conversa- 
tion echoes  under  the  low  ceiling  with  a  deafening 
buzz.  The  typical  Andalusian,  as  one  sees  him 
here,  is  a  type  quite  new  to  me,  and  a  type  singu- 
larly individual.  He  is  clean-shaved,  he  wears  a 
felt  hat  with  a  broad  flat  brim,  generally  drab  or 
Hght  grey,  clothes  often  of  the  same  colour,  and 
generally  a  very  short  coat,  ending  where  a  waist- 
coat ends,  and  very  tight  trousers ;  over  all  is  a 
voluminous  black  cloak  lined  at  the  edges  with 
crimson  velvet.  He  is  generally  of  medium  height, 
and  he  has  very  distinct  features,  somewhat  large, 
especially  the  nose;  a  face  in  which  every  line 
has  emphasis,  a  straight,  thin,  narrow  face,  a  face 
without  curves.  The  general  expression  is  one  of 
inflexibihty,  the  eyes  fixed,  the  mouth  tight ;  and 
this  fixity  of  expression  is  accentuated  by  the 
arrangement  of  the  hair,  cut  very  short,  and  shaved 
around  the  temples,  so  as  to  make  a  sharp  line 
above  the  ear,  and  a  point  in  the  middle  of  the 
forehead.  The  complexion  is  dull  olive,  and  in  old 
age  it  becomes  a  formidable  mass  of  wrinkles ;  by 
which,  indeed,  many  of  these  old  men  with  their 
clean-shaved  cheeks,  bright  eyes,  and  short  jackets, 
are    alone   to   be   distinguished    from   their   sons   or 

II 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

grandsons.  There  is  much  calm  strength  in  the 
Andalusian  face,  a  dignity  which  is  half  defiant, 
and  which  leaves  room  for  humour,  coming  slowly 
up  through  the  eyes,  the  mouth  still  more  slowly 
lengthening  into  a  smile ;  room  also  for  honest 
friendUness,  for  a  very  inquiring  interest  in  things, 
and  very  decided  personal  preferences  about  them. 
Often  the  face  runs  all  to  humour,  and  the  man 
resembles  a  comic  actor.  But  always  there  is  the 
same  earnestness  in  whatever  mood,  the  same  self- 
absorption  ;  and,  talkative  as  these  people  are,  they 
can  sit  side  by  side,  silent,  as  if  in  brooding  medita- 
tion, with  more  naturalness  than  the  people  of  any 
other  race. 

The  Andalusian  is  seen  at  his  finest  in  the  bull- 
fighter, the  idol  of  Seville,  whom  one  sees  at  every 
moment,  walking  in  the  streets,  sitting  in  his  club, 
driving  in  his  motor  car,  or  behind  his  jinghng  team 
of  horses,  dressed  in  the  tight  majo  costume,  with 
his  pig-tail  drawn  up  and  dissimulated  on  the  top 
of  his  head,  his  frilled  shirt  with  great  diamond 
studs,  his  collar  clasped  by  gold  or  diamond  fasten- 
ings, diamond  rings  glittering  on  his  well-shaped 
fingers.  I  once  sat  opposite  one  of  the  most  famous 
toreros  at  a  tahle-d'hote  dinner,  and,  as  I  contrasted 
him  with  the  heavy,  middle-class  people  who  sat 
around,  I  was  more  than  ever  impressed  by  the 
distinction,  the  physical  good-breeding,  something 
almost  of  an  intellectual  clearness  and  shapeliness, 
which  come  from  a  perfect  bodily  equipoise,  a  hand 
and  eye  trained  to  faultless  precision. 

12 


Seville. 

The  women  of  Seville  are  not  often  beautiful, 
but  one  of  the  most  beautiful  women  I  have  ever 
seen  was  a  woman  of  Seville  whom  I  watched  for  an 
hour  in  the  Cafe  America.  She  had  all  that  was 
typical  of  the  Spaniard,  and  more ;  expression,  the 
equivalent  of  a  soul,  eyes  which  were  not  merely 
fine,  but  variable  as  opals,  with  twenty  several 
delights  in  a  minute.  She  was  small,  very  white, 
with  just  that  delicate  hint  of  modelling  in  the 
cheeks  which  goes  so  well  with  pallor ;  she  had 
two  yellow  roses  in  her  black  hair,  at  the  side  of 
the  topmost  coil,  and  a  yellow  shawl  about  her 
throat.  One  wished  that  she  might  always  be 
happy. 

More  often  the  women  are  comfortable,  witty, 
bright  and  dark,  guapa,  rather  than  beautiful ; 
almost  always  with  superb  hair,  hair  which  is  like 
the  mane  or  tail  of  an  Arab  horse,  and  always  with 
tiny  feet,  on  which  they  walk  after  a  special,  careful 
way  of  their  own,  setting  down  the  whole  foot  at 
each  step,  level  from  heel  to  toe,  and  not  rising  on 
it.  In  Seville,  more  than  anywhere  else,  one  sees 
the  Spanish  woman  already  mature  in  the  child, 
and  nothing  impressed  me  more  than  these  brilliant, 
fascinating  little  people,  at  once  natural  and  con- 
scious, with  all  the  gestures  of  grown  women,  their 
way  of  walking,  their  shawls,  and,  in  their  faces, 
all  that  is  finest  in  the  Sevillana,  a  charm,  seductive- 
ness, a  sort  of  caressing  atmosphere,  and  not  merely 
bright,  hard  eyes,  clean-cut  faces,  animation,  which 
are  to   be   seen   everywhere   in   Spain.     They   have 

13 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

indeed  that  slightly  preoccupied  air  which  Spanish 
children  affect,  and  which  deepens,  in  some  of  the 
women,  into  a  kind  of  tragic  melancholy.  Pass 
through  the  Macarena  quarter  in  the  evening, 
and  you  will  see  not  the  least  characteristic  type 
of  the  women  of  Seville:  strange,  sulky,  fatal 
creatures,  standing  in  doorways,  with  flowers  in 
the  hair,  and  mysterious,  angry  eyes ;  Flamencas, 
with  long,  ugly,  tragic,  unforgettable  faces,  seeming 
to  remember  an  ancestral  unhappiness. 

There  is  a  quality  which  gives  a  certain  finish 
to  Spanish  women,  and  which  is  unique  in  them. 
It  is  a  sort  of  smiling  irony,  which  seems  to  pene- 
trate the  whole  nature  :  the  attitude  of  one  who 
is  aware  of  things,  not  unsatisfied  with  them, 
decided  in  her  own  point  of  view,  intelligent  enough 
to  be  tolerant  of  the  point  of  view  of  others,  with- 
out coquetry  or  self-consciousness ;  in  fact,  a  small, 
complete  nature,  in  which  nothing  is  left  vague  or 
uneasy.  It  is  a  disposition  such  as  this  which  goes 
to  make  life  happy,  and  it  is  enough  to  have  watched 
the  gay,  smiling,  contented  old  women  to  realise 
that  life  is  happy  to  most  women  in  Spain.  Look 
in  all  these  faces,  and  you  will  see  that  they  express 
something  very  definite,  and  that  they  express 
everything,  while  Northern  faces  have  so  much  in 
them  that  is  suggestion,  or,  as  it  seems  to  the 
Spaniard,  mere  indefiniteness.  The  Southern 
nature,  for  its  material  felicity,  has  retained  the 
Pagan,  classic  ideals ;  the  Northern  has  accepted 
the  unquiet,  dreaming  soul  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
14 


Seville. 

But  in  Spanish  women,  along  with  much  childish- 
ness and  much  simphcity,  there  is  often  all  the 
subtlety  of  the  flesh,  that  kind  of  secondary  spiritual 
subtlety  which  comes  from  exquisitely  responsive 
senses.  This  kind  of  delicacy  in  women  often 
stands  in  the  place  of  many  virtues,  of  knowledge, 
of  intellect ;  and,  in  its  way,  it  supplies  what  is 
lacking  in  them,  giving  them  as  much  refinement 
as  knowledge  or  the  virtues  would  have  done,  and 
itself  forming  a  very  profound  kind  of  intelligence. 
I  recognise  it  in  the  mournful  pallor,  and  that  long, 
immobile  gaze,  vv'hich  seems  to  touch  one's  flesh, 
like  a  slow  caress ;  that  cold  ardour,  which  is  the 
utmost  refinement  of  fire.  And  these  white  people 
carry  themselves  like  idols.  Singularly  diff"erent 
is  that  other  Spanish  kind  of  animality,  where  life 
burns  in  the  lips,  and  darkens  the  cheeks  as  if  with 
the  sun,  and  bubbles  in  the  eyes,  the  whole  body 
warm  with  a  somewhat  general,  somewhat  over- 
ready  heat.  It  is  enough  to  have  heard  the  laughter 
of  these  vivid  creatures.  It  is  the  most  delicious 
laughter  in  the  world ;  it  breaks  out  like  a  song 
from  a  bird ;  it  is  sudden,  gay,  irresponsible,  the 
laughter  of  a  moment,  and  yet  coming  straight 
from  the  deep  unconsciousness  of  life.  The  Spanish 
woman  is  a  child,  but  a  mature  Spanish  child,  know- 
ing much ;  and  in  the  average  woman  of  Seville, 
in  her  gaiety,  humour,  passion,  there  is  more  than 
usual  of  the  childlike  quality.  Their  faces  are 
full  of  sun  and  shadow,  often  with  a  rich  colour 
between  Eastern  and  Western,  and  with  the  languor 

15 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  keenness  of  both  races ;  with  something  in- 
toxicating in  the  quahty  of  their  charm,  hke  the 
scent  of  spring  in  their  orange  groves.  They  have 
the  magnetism  of  vivid  animal  Hfe,  with  a  sharp 
appeal  to  the  sensations,  as  of  a  beauty  too  full  of 
the  sap  of  life  to  be  merely  passive.  Their  bodies 
are  so  full  of  energy  that  they  have  invented  for 
themselves  a  new  kind  of  dance,  which  should  tire 
them  into  repose ;  they  live  so  actively  to  their 
finger-tips  that  their  fingers  have  made  their  own 
share  in  the  dance,  in  the  purely  Spanish  accom- 
paniment of  the  castanets.  A  dance  is  indicated 
in  a  mere  shuffle  of  the  feet,  a  snapping  of  the  fingers, 
a  clapping  of  hands,  a  bend  of  the  body,  whenever 
a  woman  of  Seville  stands  or  walks,  at  the  door 
of  her  house,  pausing  in  the  street,  or  walking, 
wrapped  in  many  shawls,  in  the  parks ;  and  the 
dance  is  as  closely  a  part  of  the  women  of  Seville 
as  their  shawls,  the  flowers  in  their  hair,  or  the 
supplementary  fingers  of  the  fan. 

IV. 

A  significant  quality  of  the  Andalusians  is  the 
profound  seriousness  which  they  retain,  even  when 
they  abandon  themselves  to  the  most  violent 
emotions.  It  is  the  true  sensuahty,  the  only  way 
of  getting  the  utmost  out  of  one's  sensations,  as 
gaiety,  or  a  facile  voluptuousness,  never  can.  The 
Spanish  nature  is  sombre  and  humorous,  ready  to 
be  startled  into  vivid  life  by  any  strong  appeal : 
i6 


Seville. 

love,  hate,  cruelty,  the  dance,  the  bull-fight,  what- 
ever is  elemental,  or  touches  the  elemental  passions. 
Seeing  Seville  as  I  did,  in  winter,  I  could  not  see 
the  people  under  their  strongest,  most  characteristic 
intoxication,  the  bull-fight;  but  I  had  the  oppor- 
tunity, whenever  I  went  into  the  street,  and  saw  a 
horse  dragging  a  burden,  of  seeing  how  natural 
to  them  is  that  cruelty  which  is  a  large  part  of  the 
attraction  of  bull-fighting.  And  their  delight  in 
violent  sensations,  sensations  which  seem  to  others 
not  quite  natural,  partly  perverse,  partly  cruel,  as 
in  the  typical  emotion  of  the  bull-fight,  is  seen  at 
Seville  in  the  cuerpo  de  baile  infantil  which 
dances  at  the  Cafe  Suizo.  These  children  of  ten 
or  eleven,  who  dance  till  midnight,  learned  in  all 
the  contortions  of  the  gipsy  dances,  which  they 
dance  with  a  queer  kind  of  innocence,  all  the  more 
thorough  in  its  partly  unconscious  method,  and 
who  run  about  in  front,  sitting  on  men's  knees  in 
their  tawdry  finery,  smiling  out  of  their  little  painted 
faces  with  an  excited  weariness ;  is  there  not  a 
cruelty  to  them,  also,  in  the  surely  perverse  senti- 
ment which  requires  their  aid  in  one's  own  amuse- 
ment ?  I  shall  never  forget  one  particular  dance 
of  two  children,  one  of  the  most  expressive  gipsy 
dances,  danced  in  trailing  dresses,  inside  which,  as 
inside  some  fantastic,  close  prison  or  cage,  they 
hopped  and  leaped  and  writhed,  like  puppets  or 
living  tops,  to  the  stupefying  rattle  of  castanets ; 
parodying  the  acts  of  physical  desire,  the  coquetry 
of  the  animal,  with  an  innocent  knowingness,  as  if  it 

17 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

were  the  most  amusing,  the  most  exciting  of  games. 
One  of  them  was  a  httle,  sallow,  thin  creature,  with 
narrow  eyes  and  an  immense  mouth,  drawn  almost 
painfully  into  a  too-eager  smile;  a  grimacing, 
Chinese  mask  of  a  child,  almost  in  tears  with  nervous 
excitement,  quivering  all  over  with  the  energy  of 
the  dance.  I  went  to  see  them,  indeed,  frequently, 
as  I  should  have  gone  to  see  the  bull-fights,  and 
with  the  same  mental  reservation.  They  reminded 
me  of  the  horses. 

All  Spanish  dancing,  and  especially  the  dancing 
of  the  gipsies,  in  which  it  is  seen  in  its  most  char- 
acteristic development,  has  a  sexual  origin,  and 
expresses,  as  Eastern  dancing  does,  but  less  crudely, 
the  pantomime  of  physical  love.  In  the  typical 
gipsy  dance,  as  I  saw  it  danced  by  a  beautiful 
Gitana  at  Seville,  there  is  something  of  mere  gamin- 
erie  and  something  of  the  devil;  the  automatic 
tramp-tramp  of  the  children  and  the  lascivious 
pantomime  of  a  very  learned  art  of  love.  Thus 
it  has  all  the  excitement  of  something  spontaneous 
and  studied,  of  vice  and  a  kind  of  naughty  innocence, 
of  the  thoughtless  gaiety  of  youth  as  well  as  the 
knowing  humour  of  experience.  For  it  is  a  dance 
full  of  humour,  fuller  of  humour  than  of  passion ; 
passion  indeed  it  mimics  on  the  purely  animal 
side,  and  with  a  sort  of  coldness  even  in  its  frenzy. 
It  is  capable  of  infinite  variations ;  it  is  a  drama, 
but  a  drama  improvised  on  a  given  theme;  and  it 
might  go  on  indefinitely,  for  it  is  conditioned  only 
by  the  pantomime,  which  we  know  to  have  wide 
i8 


Seville. 

limits.  A  motion  more  or  less,  and  it  becomes 
obscene  or  innocent ;  it  is  always  on  a  doubtful 
verge,  and  thus  gains  its  extraordinary  fascination. 
I  held  my  breath  as  I  watched  the  gipsy  in  the 
Seville  dancing-hall;  I  felt  myself  swaying  un- 
consciously to  the  rhythm  of  her  body,  of  her 
beckoning  hands,  of  the  glittering  smile  that  came 
and  went  in  her  eyes.  I  seemed  to  be  drawn  into 
a  shining  whirlpool,  in  which  I  turned,  turned, 
hearing  the  buzz  of  the  water  settUng  over  my 
head.  The  guitar  buzzed,  buzzed,  in  a  prancing 
rhythm,  the  gipsy  coiled  about  the  floor,  in  her 
trailing  dress,  never  so  much  as  showing  her  ankles, 
with  a  rapidity  concentrated  upon  itself;  her  hands 
beckoned,  reached  out,  clutched  dehcately,  hved 
to  their  finger-tips ;  her  body  straightened,  bent, 
the  knees  bent  and  straightened,  the  heels  beat  on 
the  floor,  carrying  her  backwards  and  round ;  the 
toes  pointed,  paused,  pointed,  and  the  body  drooped 
or  rose  into  immobility,  a  smiling,  significant  pause 
of  the  whole  body.  Then  the  motion  became 
again  more  vivid,  more  restrained,  as  if  teased  by 
some  unseen  limits,  as  if  turning  upon  itself  in  the 
vain  desire  of  escape,  as  if  caught  in  its  own  toils ; 
more  feverish,  more  fatal,  the  humour  turning 
painful,  with  the  pain  of  achieved  desire;  more 
earnest,  more  eager,  with  the  languor  in  which 
desire  dies  triumphant. 

A  less  elaborate,  less  perverse  kind  of  dancing 
is  to  be  seen  in  the  cafes,  in  little  pantomimic 
ballets,    imitated    from    French    models,    but    done 

19 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

with  a  Spanish  simpHcity  of  emphasis.  There  is, 
in  such  things,  a  frank,  devil-may-care  indecency, 
part  of  a  boisterous  hilarity,  which  has  all  the  air 
of  an  accidental  improvisation,  as  indeed  it  often 
is ;  and  this  hilarity  is  tossed  to  and  fro  from  stage 
to  audience  and  from  audience  to  stage,  as  if  a  crowd 
of  lively  people  had  become  a  Uttle  merry  at  the 
corner  of  a  street.  The  Spanish  (look  at  their 
comic  papers)  are  so  explicit !  It  is  not  cold  or 
calculated,  like  that  other,  more  significant,  kind  of 
dancing;  it  is  done  with  youth  and  delighted 
energy,  and  as  among  friends,  and  by  people  to 
whom  a  certain  explicit  kind  of  coarseness  is  natural. 


V. 

Seville  is  not  a  religious  city,  as  Valencia  is ; 
but  it  has  woven  the  ceremonies  of  religion  into  its 
life,  into  its  amusements,  with  a  minuteness  of 
adaptation  certainly  unparalleled.  Nowhere  as  in 
Spain  does  one  so  realise  the  sacred  drama  of  the 
Mass.  The  costumes,  the  processions,  the  dim 
lighting,  the  spectacular  arrangement  of  the  churches 
and  ceremonies,  the  religious  attitude  of  the  people, 
kneeling  on  the  bare  stones,  the  penitent  aspect  of 
their  black  dresses  and  mantillas,  intermingled  with 
the  bright  peasant  colours  which  seem  to  bring  the 
poor  people  so  intimately  into  association  with  the 
mysteries  of  religion  :  all  this  has  its  part  in  giving 
the  Church  its  dramatic  pre-eminence.  And  in 
Seville  the  ceremonies  of  the  Church  are  carried 
20 


Seville. 

out  with  more  detail,  more  spectacular  appeal, 
than  anywhere  else  in  Spain,  that  is  to  say,  more 
than  anywhere  in  the  world.  All  Europe  flocks 
to  see  the  celebrations  of  Holy  Week,  which  must 
have  come  down  unchanged  from  the  Middle 
Ages ;  a  piece  of  immense  mediaeval  childishness, 
which  still  suits  the  humour  of  Seville  perfectly. 
And  it  is  not  only  in  Holy  Week  that  one  may 
see  the  most  characteristic  of  all  these  ceremonies, 
the  sacred  dances  in  the  Cathedral,  but  also  at  the 
great  feast  of  the  Immaculate  Conception,  which  is 
peculiarly  a  Sevillan  feast. 

On  that  day,  the  8th  December,  I  attended  Mass 
in  the  Cathedral.  The  gold  and  silver  plate  had 
been  laid  out  by  the  side  of  the  altar,  crimson 
drapings  covered  the  walls,  the  priests  wore  their 
terno  celeste,  blue  and  gold  vestments ;  the 
Seises,  who  were  to  dance  later  on,  were  there  in 
their  blue  and  white  costume  of  the  time  of  Philip 
HI. ;  the  acolytes  wore  gilt  mitres,  and  carried 
silver-topped  staves  and  blue  canopies.  There 
was  a  procession  through  the  church,  the  Arch- 
bishop and  the  Alcaldia  walking  in  state,  to  the 
sound  of  sad  voices  and  hautboys,  and  amidst  clouds 
of  rolling  white  incense,  and  between  rows  of 
women  dressed  in  black,  with  black  mantillas  over 
their  heads.  The  Mass  itself,  with  its  elaborate 
ritual,  was  sung  to  the  very  Spanish  music  of 
Eslava  :  and  the  Dean's  sermon,  with  its  flowery 
eloquence,  flowers  out  of  the  Apocalypse  and  out 
of    the    fields    of    la    Tierra    de    Maria    Santisimay 

21 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

was  not  less  typically  Spanish.  At  five  o'clock  I 
returned  to  the  Cathedral  to  see  the  dance  of  the 
Seises.  There  was  but  little  Hght  except  about 
the  altar,  which  blazed  with  candles;  suddenly 
a  curtain  was  drawn  aside,  and  the  sixteen  boys, 
in  their  blue  and  white  costume,  holding  plumed 
hats  in  their  hands,  came  forward  and  knelt  before 
the  altar.  The  priests,  who  had  been  chanting, 
came  up  from  the  choir,  the  boys  rose,  and  formed 
in  two  eights,  facing  each  other,  in  front  of  the 
altar,  and  the  priests  knelt  in  a  semicircle  around 
them.  Then  an  unseen  orchestra  began  to  play, 
and  the  boys  put  on  their  hats,  and  began  to  sing 
the  coplas  in  honour  of  the  Virgin : 

0  mi,  0  mi  amada 
Innnacidada! 

as  they  sang,  to  a  dance-measure.  After  they  had 
sung  the  coplas  they  began  to  dance,  still  singing. 
It  was  a  kind  of  solemn  minuet,  the  feet  never 
taken  from  the  ground,  a  minuet  of  delicate  stepping 
and  intricate  movement,  in  which  a  central  square 
would  form,  divide,  a  whole  line  passing  through 
the  opposite  line,  the  outer  ends  then  repeating  one 
another's  movements  while  the  others  formed  and 
divided  again  in  the  middle.  The  first  movement 
was  very  slow,  the  second  faster,  ending  with  a 
pirouette;  then  came  two  movements  without 
singing,  but  with  the  accompaniment  of  castanets, 
the  first  movement  again  very  slow,  the  second  a 
quick  rattle  of  the  castanets,  Hke  the  rolling  of 
kettle-drums,   but  done  without  raising  the  hands 

22 


Seville. 

above  the  level  of  the  elbows.  Then  the  whole 
thing  was  repeated  from  the  beginning,  the  boys 
flourished  off  their  hats,  dropped  on  their  knees 
before  the  altar,  and  went  quickly  out.  One  or 
two  verses  were  chanted,  the  Archbishop  gave 
his  benediction,  and  the  ceremony  was  over. 

And,  yes,  I  found  it  perfectly  dignified,  perfectly 
religious,  without  a  suspicion  of  levity  or  indecorum. 
This  consecration  of  the  dance,  this  turning  of  a 
possible  vice  into  a  means  of  devotion,  this  bringing 
of  the  people's  art,  the  people's  passion,  which  in 
Seville  is  dancing,  into  the  church,  finding  it  a 
place  there,  is  precisely  one  of  those  acts  of  divine 
worldly  wisdom  which  the  Church  has  so  often 
practised  in  her  conquest  of  the  world.  And  it  is 
a  quite  logical  development  of  that  very  elaborate 
pantomime,  using  the  word  in  all  seriousness, 
which  the  ceremonies  of  the  Church  really  are, 
since  all  have  their  symboHcal  meaning,  which 
they  express  by  their  gestures.  Already  we  find 
in  them  every  art  but  one  :  poetry,  the  very  sub- 
stance of  the  Hturgy,  oratory,  music,  both  of  voices 
and  instruments,  sculpture,  painting,  all  the  decora- 
tive arts,  costume,  perfume,  every  art  lending  its 
service ;  and  now  at  last  dancing  finds  its  natural 
place  there,  in  the  one  city  of  the  world  where  its 
presence  is  most  perfectly  in  keeping. 

Winter,  1898. 

23 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

Spanish  art,  before  Velasquez  discovered  the  world, 
is  an  art  made  for  churches  and  convents,  to  the 
glory  of  God,  never  to  the  glory  of  earth.     "The 
chief   end    of   art,"    says    Pacheco,    the    master    of 
Velasquez,   in  his  treatise  on  the   art   of  painting, 
**is  to  persuade  men  to  piety,  and  to  raise  them  to 
God."     In  other  countries,   men  have  painted  the 
Virgin  and  the  Saints,  for  patrons,  and  because  the 
subject  was  set  them;    sometimes  piously,   and  in 
the  spirit  of  the  Church  ;   but  more  often  after  some 
"profane"   fashion  of  their  own,   as   an  excuse  for 
the  august  or  mournful  or  simple  human  presence 
of    beauty.     But    in    Spain    pictures    painted    for 
churches  are  pictures  painted  by  those  to  whom  God 
is  more  than  beauty,  and  life  more  than  one  of  its 
accidents.     The  visible  world  is  not  a  divine  play- 
thing to  them.     It  is  the  abode  of  human  life,  and 
human   life   is    a   short   way   leading  to   the   grave. 
They    are    full    of  the    sense   of  corruption,    actual 
physical  rotting  away  in  the  grave,  as  we  see  it  in 
two    famous    pictures    of   Valdes    Leal.     And    they 
have  also  a  profound  pity  for  human  misery,  that 
pity  for  the  poor  which  is  still  one  of  the  character- 
istics of  the  Spaniard  ;   their  pictures  are  full  of  halt 
and   maimed   beggars,   rendered  with   all  the  truth 
of  a  sympathy  which  finds  their  distortion  a  natural 
part  of  the  world,  a  part  to  be  succoured,  not  to  be 
turned   away   from.     But   Heaven,   the   Saints,   the 
Virgin,  are  equally  real  to  them;    and  Murillo  will 
paint   the   Trinity,   without    mystery    and   without 
24 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

dignity,  with  only  a  sense  of  the  human  closeness 
of  that  abstract  idea  to  the  human  mind.  Thus  we 
have,  for  the  most  part,  no  landscapes,  rarely  an 
indication,  even  in  a  background,  of  external  nature 
loved  and  copied,  and  brought  into  the  picture  for 
its  own  sake,  as  a  beautiful  thing.  Seriousness,  and 
absorption  in  human  life,  a  mystical  absorption  in 
the  divine  life,  these  qualities  are  the  quahties  which 
determine  the  whole  course  of  Spanish  painting. 

Emotion,  in  the  Spaniard,  is  based  on  a  deep 
substratum  of  brooding  seriousness ;  some  kind  of 
instinctive  pessimism  being  always,  even  in  those 
untouched  by  rehgion,  the  shadow  upon  life.  In 
Velasquez  it  is  the  intolerable  indifference  of  nature, 
of  natural  fate,  weighing  upon  those  unhappy  kings 
and  princes  whom  he  has  painted,  from  their  solemn 
childhood  to  their  mature  unhappiness.  In  Murillo 
it  is  a  tragic  intensity  of  ascetic  emotion,  the  dark- 
ness out  of  which  his  sunlight  breaks.  In  Zurbaran 
darkness  swallows  daylight,  and  his  kneehng  monk, 
contemplating  the  emptiness  of  life  in  the  extrav- 
agant mirror  of  a  skull,  in  the  midst  of  a  great 
void  of  night,  shows  us  to  what  point  this  reUgious 
gloom  can  extend.  Ribera  lacerates  the  flesh  of  his 
martyrs,  and  tears  open  their  bodies  before  us,  with 
almost  the  passion  of  Goya's  cannibal  eating  a 
woman.  In  Goya  we  see  both  extremes,  the  whole 
gamut  from  wild  gaiety  to  sombre  horror  of  the 
Spanish  temperament.  The  world  for  him  is  a 
stage  full  of  puppets,  coloured  almost  more  naturally 
than  nature,  playing  at  all  the  games  of  humanity 

25 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

with  a  profound,  cruel,  and  fantastic  unconscious- 
.ness.  Rarely  indeed  do  we  find  a  painter  to  whom 
,/ the  idea  of  beauty  has  been  supreme,  or  who  has 
loved  colour  for  its  own  sake,  or  who  has  passion- 
ately apprehended  ornament.  The  moment  the 
sense  of  beauty  is  not  concentrated  upon  reality, 
or  upon  vision  which  becomes  reality,  it  loses  pre- 
cision, passing  easily  into  sentimentality,  affectation, 
one  form  or  another  of  extravagance. 

This  overpoweringly  serious  sense  of  reality, 
human  or  divine,  to  which  everything  else  is 
sacrificed,  brings  with  it,  to  Spanish  painters,  many 
dangers  which  they  have  not  escaped,  and  gives 
them  at  their  best  their  singular  triumphs.  Their 
broad  painting,  with  so  little  lingering  over  detail, 
except  at  times  anatomical  detail,  their  refusal  to 
pause  by  the  way  over  the  seductions  and  delicate 
unrealities  of  beauty,  point  the  way  to  the  great 
final  manner  of  Velasquez.  Velasquez,  we  say,  is 
life ;  but  life  was  what  every  Spanish  painter  aimed 
at,  and  some  surprised,  agam  and  again,  with  fine 
effect.  All  these  painters  of  Martyrdoms,  and 
Assumptions,  and  Biblical  legends,  painted  with  a 
vivid  sense  of  the  reality  of  these  things :  their 
pictures  tell  stories,  a  quality  which  it  is  the  present 
unwise,  limited  fashion  to  deprecate ;  that  is  to  say, 
they  are  always  conscious  of  human  emotion  ex- 
pressing itself  actively  in  gesture  —  Spanish  gesture 
of  course,  which  is  very  different  from  ours.  Doubt- 
less there  is  no  aim  so  difiicult  of  attamment,  so 
dangerous  in  intention,  as  this  aim  at  fixing  life, 
26 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

movement,  and  passionate  movement,  in  a  picture. 
Doubtless,  also,  for  the  perfect  realisation  of  this 
aim,  we  have  to  wait  for  Velasquez,  who  sees  the 
danger,  and  avoids  it,  as  no  one  had  yet  perfectly 
succeeded  in  avoiding  it,  by  an  art  wholly  un- 
traditional,  wholly  of  his  invention. 

At  Seville,  where  Velasquez  was  born,  and  did 
his  early,  perfunctory,  religious  painting,  there  is 
not  a  single  example  of  his  work,  with  the  very 
doubtful  exception  of  the  small  picture  of  the 
Virgin  giving  her  mantle  to  Saint  Ildefonso,  which 
hangs  in  the  private  part  of  the  Archbishop's  Palace. 
But  Velasquez,  who  was  of  Spanish  and  Portuguese 
origin,  and  who  worked  almost  entirely  for  the 
Court,  is  not  properly  a  Sevillan  painter.  The 
painters  properly  of  Seville,  those  who  were  born 
there,  or  at  no  great  distance,  and  did  the  main  part 
of  their  work  there,  from  Juan  Sanchez  de  Castro 
in  the  fifteenth  century,  to  Murillo  and  his  im- 
mediate successors  at  the  end  of  the  seventeenth, 
can  be  seen  very  thoroughly,  and  can  only  be 
thoroughly  seen,  in  the  Museo  and  the  churches 
of  Seville.  Out  of  Seville  Murillo  is  an  enigma, 
Alejo  Fernandez  is  unknown.  And  in  tracing  the 
course  of  painting  in  Seville,  we  are  not  far  from 
tracing  the  course  of  Spanish  painting,  so  few  are 
the  painters,  except  the  little  group  at  Valencia, 
who  were  born  out  of  Andalusia. 

Painting  in  Seville  begins  with  pure  decoration, 
in  the  three  fourteenth-century  frescoes  of  the 
Virgin ;     the   Antigua   in   the    chapel   named    after 

27 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

it  in  the  Cathedral ;  Nuestra  Senora  del  Corral, 
in  San  Ildefonso ;  and  S.  Maria  de  Rocamador, 
in  San  Lorenzo.  All  three  come  from  a  wise  and 
happy  childhood  of  art,  when  painters  were  content 
with  beautiful  patterns,  the  solid  splendour  of  gold, 
a  Byzantine  convention  in  faces,  these  long  oval 
faces,  with  their  almost  Japanese  outlines  of  cheek 
and  eyebrows.  S.  Maria  de  Rocamador  is  larger 
than  life-size,  she  wears  a  blue  robe  and  a  mantle 
of  dull  purple,  spotted  with  golden  stars  and  acorns, 
and  bordered  with  gold  braid  ;  an  arched  or  bent 
coronet  is  on  her  head,  against  the  glowing  halo ; 
she  holds  the  child  in  her  arms,  and  two  little  angels 
kneel  on  each  side  of  her  head.  The  background 
is  all  of  gold,  the  Gothic  gold,  woven  into  a  con- 
ventional pattern.  It  is  a  piece  of  pure  convention, 
in  which  colour  and  pattern  are  felt  delicately,  as 
so  much  decoration. 

With  the  fifteenth  century  life  comes  playfully 
into  this  artificial  paradise ;  and  the  first  signed 
picture  in  Seville,  the  Saint  Christopher  of  Juan 
Sanchez  de  Castro  in  San  Julian,  is  a  vast,  humorous 
thing,  reaching  nearly  to  the  ceiling,  more  than 
three  times  life-size,  a  child's  dream  of  a  picture. 
It  is  painted  in  all  seriousness,  and,  so  far  as  one 
can  judge  through  bad  repainting  and  subsequent 
rotting  away  of  the  plaster,  painted  with  no  little 
power.  The  Saint  fills  almost  the  whole  of  the 
picture;  he  carries  the  child  Christ  on  his  shoulder, 
leaning  on  a  pine  tree,  and  the  hermit  comes  out 
on  shore  with  his  lantern,  in  front  of  a  little  chapel, 
28 


i 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

and  looks  into  the  darkness.  The  hermit  reaches 
just  above  Saint  Christopher's  knee,  and  two  pil- 
grims, with  staves  and  cloaks  and  pilgrim  bottles, 
are  travelHng  along  his  girdle,  as  he  wades  in  the 
deep  water,  which  just  covers  his  ankles.  His  face 
is  naive  and  homely,  with  a  certain  pensiveness  in 
the  huge  eyes;  and  the  child  seems  to  hold  in  his 
hand  the  glove  of  the  world,  on  which  rises  already 
the  symbol  of  his  cross.  The  whole  picture,  with 
its  humour  and  yet  solemnity,  its  childish  sense  of 
the  natural  wonder  of  a  miracle,  is  a  quite  sincere 
attempt  to  render  a  scene  supposed  to  have  really 
happened,  just  as  it  might  have  happened.  It 
may  be  contrasted  with  the  other  huge  Saint 
Christopher  in  Seville,  the  fresco  of  Matteo  Alessio 
in  the  Cathedral,  where  an  ItaHan  painter  has 
done  no  more  than  paint  an  unconvincing  picture 
of  a  miracle  in  which,  it  is  evident,  he  had  no  more 
than  the  scene-painter's  interest. 

Between  Sanchez  de  Castro  and  his  pupil,  Juan 
Nuiiez,  there  is  a  wide  interval;  for  Nufiez,  in  the 
wooden  panel  in  the  Cathedral,  a  Pieta,  is  completely 
but  very  archaically  Flemish,  with  quite  another, 
more  formal,  more  awkward,  kind  of  childishness 
in  design  and  colour.  But  he  leads,  quite  naturally, 
to  Alejo  Fernandez,  and  in  Alejo  Fernandez  we 
have  almost  a  great  painter,  and  a  painter  in  whom 
Spanish  painting  in  Seville  first  becomes  conscious 
of  itself,  and  capable  of  saying  what  it  has  to  say. 
In  some  of  his  pictures  an  archaic  stiffness  has  not 
yet  freed  itself  from  the  golden  bonds  of  that  early 

29 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Gothic  work  of  which  his  work  so  often  reminds  us ; 
but  Flemish  models  showed  him  the  way  which  he 
was  seeking  for  himself;  and,  under  that  Northern 
influence,  always  so  salutary  for  the  Spanish  tem- 
perament, he  makes  at  last  a  new  thing,  profoundly 
his  own. 

In  the  delicious  Virgin  of  the  Rose  in  the  church 
of  Santa  Ana  in  Triana,  we  see  those  early  Virgins 
of  the  fourteenth  century  growing  human,  but 
in  the  same  embowering  decoration  of  gold  and 
stars.  She  sits  with  the  child  under  a  golden 
canopy  in  a  robe  of  elaborate  pattern,  an  almost 
Chinese  pattern  of  leaves  and  stems,  in  pale  gold 
on  brown,  and  she  holds  a  white  rose  in  her  hand. 
She  holds  out  the  rose  to  the  child,  who  looks  with 
serious,  childish  interest  into  the  open  pages  of  a 
brightly  illuminated  book.  Two  angels  lean,  a 
little  awkwardly,  on  each  arm  of  her  chair ;  but  with 
a  certain  charm  in  their  naive,  pointed  faces,  in  their 
bright  gold  curls  falhng  over.  Higher  up  two 
strange  figures,  probably  cherubim,  stand,  arrested 
in  flight,  against  the  upper  folds  of  the  canopy. 
At  the  back  there  is  a  glimpse  of  rocky  and  wooded 
country  in  pale  blue.  A  smaller  picture  in  the  same 
church  shows  another  Virgin  and  Child  with  the 
same  bright  gold  canopy,  with  little  flying  angels 
holding  a  coronet  above  the  halo ;  and  here,  too, 
in  the  pathetic  eyes  of  the  Virgin,  in  the  child's 
gesture,  there  is  the  same  humanity,  coming  not 
too  sharply  through  a  traditional  form.  In  two 
other  small  pictures,  the  Adoration  of  the  Magi  and 
30 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

Saint  Rufina  and  Saint  Justina,  we  have  this 
dehcate,  just  a  Httle  fettered,  sense  of  beauty;  in 
the  Virgin,  meek,  and  with  flowing  golden  hair;  in 
the  almost  sly,  Sevillan  smile  of  the  Patron  Saint  of 
the  Giralda.  There  is  always  the  same  delight  in 
colour  and  ornament :  the  bright  swords  and  cloaks 
of  the  Magi,  their  golden  goblets,  the  elaborate 
patterns  of  gold  on  brown  in  robes  and  cloaks ;  and 
it  is  precisely  this  quality  which  we  find  so  rarely 
in  Spanish  painters,  never,  indeed,  quite  thoroughly, 
except  in  the  pictures  of  this  one  painter. 

In  the  church  of  St.  Julian  there  is  an  altar-piece 
in  eight  divisions  (of  which  one  is  a  copy),  telling 
many  incidents  in  the  life  of  the  Virgin ;  and  in 
this  series  of  pictures  we  see  Alejo  Fernandez  under 
a  somewhat  diflPerent  aspect,  as  a  painter  for  whom 
the  visible  world  exists,  not  only  as  beauty,  but  as 
drama.  Natural  feeling,  a  vivid  and  tender  sim- 
plicity, a  curious  personal  kind  of  sentiment,  dis- 
tinguish these  pictures,  in  which  St.  Joseph,  for  the 
most  part  no  very  active  spectator  in  the  events  of 
the  divine  drama,  is  for  once  accepted  as  a  natural, 
prominent  actor  in  them.  In  one,  the  Virgin  and 
St.  Joseph  kneel  on  either  side  of  the  newly-born 
child,  with  a  serene,  homely  unity  of  devotion.  In 
the  Adoration  of  the  Magi,  Joseph  leans  over  his 
wife's  shoulder,  his  finger-tips  set  together,  watching 
curiously.  At  the  Circumcision,  both  hold  the 
child  before  the  priest.  As  Jesus  goes  up  the  steps 
of  the  Temple,  to  reason  with  the  doctors,  Joseph 
sits  reflectively  beside  Mary.     And  at  the  end,  after 

31 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

all  is  over,  it  is  into  Joseph's  arms  that  Mary  flings 
herself,  her  face  distorted  with  sorrow ;  and  it  is 
mainly  with  solicitude  for  her  that  his  face  is  sorrow- 
ful. Both  grow  old  together,  older  in  every  picture, 
the  hair  whitening,  the  wrinkles  forming  in  the  face 
of  Joseph ;  and  in  every  picture  there  is  a  simple, 
earnest  attempt  to  tell  the  real  story,  with  thought- 
fully and  tenderly  felt  details.  Whatever  may  still 
be  at  times  conventional  in  the  painting,  as  in  the 
long  oval  face  of  the  Virgin,  there  is  no  convention 
in  the  arrangement  of  the  scene,  the  way  of  telling 
a  story. 

In  the  large  Adoration  of  the  Magi,  and  in  the 
three  still  larger  pictures  of  the  Birth  and  Purifica- 
tion of  the  Virgin  and  the  Reconciliation  of  St, 
Joachim  and  St.  Anne,  of  which  the  first  is  now  in 
the  Sagrario  de  los  Calices,  and  the  three  others  in 
almost  impenetrable  darkness  in  the  Sacrista  Alta 
of  the  Cathedral,  we  see  united  in  the  same  com- 
position the  half  artificial  beauty  of  the  Virgin  of 
the  Rose  and  the  dramatic  sense  and  human  sim- 
plicity of  the  altar-piece  in  San  Julian.  Here  there 
is  the  same  solid  gold  and  elaborate  raiment  and 
jewelled  magnificence  :  in  the  robes  of  the  Magi, 
for  instance,  and  the  elaborately  arranged  hair  of 
Melchior  with  its  golden  hair-pins ;  but  nowhere 
else  has  life  come  so  directly  into  the  picture.  Jan 
Van  Eyck  might  almost  have  painted  the  sombre 
and  suffering  face  of  Melchior  under  the  golden 
hair-pins ;  but  it  is  Alejo  Fernandez,  now  entirely 
master  of  his  method,  who  has  brought  a  new  beauty 
32 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

into  the  face  of  the  Virgin,  as  she  kneels,  in  the  very 
act  of  hfe,  in  one  of  the  pictures  done  in  her  honour. 
Two  serving-maids,  in  another  of  the  series,  have  in 
them  the  whole  warmth  and  brightness  of  Seville, 
and  might  have  been  painted  from  models  of  to-day. 
And  there  are  grave,  bearded  faces,  the  face  of 
Joseph,  who  stands  beside  Mary  as  the  angel 
descends  out  of  heaven,  in  which  life  has  no  less  of 
the  exact  impress  of  hfe.  Seeing  these  pictures  as 
I  did,  point  by  point  at  the  end  of  a  candle  and  a 
bunch  of  tow,  without  the  possibility  of  seeing  them 
as  a  whole,  I  can  only  guess  at  how  much  I  have 
lost,  in  compositions  so  finely  imagined,  so  truthful 
and  full  of  tender  human  feeling,  and  at  the  same 
time  so  gravely  splendid  in  colour  and  decoration. 

Here,  for  all  the  influence  of  Flemish  art  and  of 
the  art  of  the  unknown  Spanish  masters  of  the 
fourteenth  century,  we  have  an  art  essentially 
Spanish,  going  indeed  beyond  the  usual  Spanish 
limits  in  its  delicate  care  for  beauty.  The  Dutch- 
man Kempeneer,  known  in  Spain  as  Pedro  Campaiia, 
whose  painting  is  almost  contemporary  with  that 
of  Alejo  Fernandez,  belongs  to  quite  another  world 
of  form  and  sentiment,  and  in  his  attempt,  as  we  are 
told,  to  imitate  Michel  Angelo,  he  becomes  at  times 
almost  more  Spanish  than  the  Spaniards.  His  very 
vigorous,  extravagant  Descent  from  the  Cross,  in 
the  Sacrista  Mayor  of  the  Cathedral,  with  its  crude 
colour  and  powerful  sense  of  action,  was  greatly 
admired  and  extravagantly  praised  by  Murillo.  At 
other  times  Campana  shows  us  all  his  inequalities 

33 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

at  a  glance,  as  in  the  altar-piece  in  many  compart- 
ments of  the  Capilla  del  Mariscal,  where  the  meek 
and  serious  heads  of  the  donors,  painted  with 
admirable  Flemish  realism  in  the  lower  compart- 
ments, contrast  with  the  exclamatory,  spectacular 
movement  of  the  central  scenes.  I  am  quite  unable 
to  understand  the  enthusiasm  which  still  exists  in 
Spain  for  this  painter,  as  I  am  unable  to  understand 
the  enthusiasm  which  exists  for  his  more  interesting 
contemporary,  Luis  de  Vargas.  Just  as  I  am  told 
that  Campana  is  the  Spanish  Michel  Angelo,  so 
Luis  de  Vargas,  I  am  told,  is  the  Spanish  Raphael. 
Luis  de  Vargas  had  been  a  pupil  of  Perino  del  Vaga, 
perhaps  of  Raphael  himself,  and  he  brought  back 
with  him  from  Italy  many  secrets  of  painting  and 
much  of  the  manner  of  the  men  who  came  after 
Raphael.  Much  of  his  work  has  perished ;  the 
famous  frescoes  have  been  washed  off  from  the  walls 
of  the  Giralda,  leaving  only  a  few  faintly  coloured 
traces  of  bishops'  mitres  and  the  outlines  of  kneeling 
figures.  I  was  unfortunate  in  not  being  able  to 
see  his  masterpiece,  the  Temporal  Generation  of 
Christ  (known  as  La  Gamha),  and  the  pictures 
of  the  Altar  del  Nascimiento,  so  carefully  had  they 
been  covered  during  the  restoration  of  the  Cathedral. 
The  portrait  of  Fernando  de  Contreras,  in  the 
Sagrario  de  los  Calices,  is  a  serious  study  after 
nature,  faithful  to  all  the  details  of  half-shaved 
cheeks  and  the  like,  hard,  unsympathetic,  not 
without  character.  But  the  large  Pieta  in  Santa 
Maria  la  Blanca  seemed  to  show  me  a  thoroughly 

34 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

skilful,  but  an  insincere  painter,  whom  Italy  had 
spoilt,  as  just  then  it  was  spoiling  all  Spanish  art. 
Pacheco,  in  his  Arte  de  la  Pintura,  tells  us  that  Luis 
de  Vargas  was  "  a  rare  example  of  Christian  painters," 
that  he  confessed  and  partook  of  the  sacraments 
often,  devoted  a  certain  space  of  every  day  to 
religious  meditation,  "and,  with  the  profound  con- 
sideration of  his  death,  composed  his  life;"  after 
his  death,  a  hair  shirt  and  scourge  were  found, 
asperisimos  cilicios  y  disciplinas.  His  pictures  preach, 
says  Pacheco ;  and  indeed  in  this  picture  I  am 
perfectly  willing  to  believe  in  his  religious  sincerity, 
but  I  cannot  believe  in  his  artistic  sincerity.  The 
painting  is  flat  and  smooth,  the  composition  elegant, 
with  a  curious  mingling  of  Raphaelesque  sweetness 
with  extreme  realism,  as  in  the  careful  anatomy  of 
the  dead  Christ,  ghastly  in  death,  showing  the  stains 
of  blood,  the  falling  open  of  the  mouth,  the  darken- 
ing of  the  flesh  of  the  feet.  Here,  the  piety  of  the 
feehng,  the  aim  at  telling  a  story,  at  rendering  a 
scene  with  dramatic  emphasis,  have  produced  only 
unreality ;  it  is  academic,  not  emotional ;  we  see 
only  an  eff"ect  that  has  been  aimed  at,  and  indeed 
skilfully  reahsed,  not  a  story  that  has  been  told  for 
its  own  sake,  as  it  might  have  happened. 

The  influence  here  is  Raphael ;  in  el  divino 
Morales,  a  painter  in  whom  religion  seems  to 
darken  into  fanaticism,  we  see  a  more  personal 
originality  evolving  itself  from  a  very  eclectic  train- 
ing. In  his  early  pictures,  none  of  which  are  to  be 
seen  in  Seville,  but  of  which  the  Prado  has  a  charming 

35 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Virgin  and  Child  and  a  Presentation  in  the  Temple, 
there  is   a  certain  naivete,   a   pale   Italian  elegance. 
Later    on,    as    he    becomes    himself,    the    colouring 
darkens,  the  composition  hardens,  the  emphasis  of 
expression  becomes  painful,  the  anatomical  minute- 
ness of  this  lean,  brown  flesh  is  like  that  of  the  early 
Flemish    painters,    or   hke   that    of    German   wood- 
carvers  ;     might   indeed    almost   be    carved   out    of 
brown  wood.     In  such  pictures  as  the   triptych  in 
the  Cathedral,  or  as  the  Pieta  in  the  Bellas  Artes  at 
Madrid,   in  all  his  figures  of  the   Man  of  Sorrows 
and  the  Mother  of  Sorrows,  everything  is  sacrificed 
to  an  attempt  to  express  superhuman  emotion,  and, 
among  other  qualities,  the  "modesty  of  nature"  is 
sacrificed,  so  that  a  too  intense  desire  of  sincerity 
becomes,  as  it  is  so  hable  to  do,  a  new,  poignant  kind 
of  affectation.     Intensity  of  sentiment  in  these  faces 
is    like    a    disease,    sharpening   the   hneaments    and 
discolouring  the  blood,  and  putting  all  the  suffering 
languidness  of  fever  into  the  eyes.     They  grimace 
with  sorrow  more  violently  than  the  sorrowful  faces 
of  Crivelli,  or  the  most  violent  German  emphasis  ; 
literally  they  sweat  blood,  they  have  all  the  physical 
disgrace  of  pain;    they  are  no  longer  persons,  but 
emblems,  the  emblems  of  the  divine  agony,   as  it 
appears  to  the  pious  Spaniard,  whom  it  pleases  to 
see  the  stains  of  blood  on  his  crucifix. 

In  passing  from  Morales  to  el  clerigo  Roelas, 
the  sharpness  of  the  contrast  is  slightly  broken  by 
Pedro  Villegas  Marmolejo,  who,  in  his  pictures  in 
the  Cathedral  and  in  San  Pedro,  works  very  quietly 
36 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

under  Italian  influence,  not  without  charm,  though 
without  originaUty.  In  Juan  de  las  Roelas,  who 
is  thought  to  have  studied  at  Venice,  the  Itahan 
Renaissance  has  done  all  it  can  do  for  Spanish 
painting.  Venetian  in  his  soft  warmth  of  colour, 
in  the  suavity  of  his  handling,  Roelas  is  thoroughly 
Spanish  in  his  profound  religious  sentiment  (he 
was  a  priest,  and  died  Canon  of  Olivares)  and  in 
his  simple  and  vigorous  sense  of  human  incident. 
There  is  careless  brushwork  in  his  paintings, 
spaces  are  sometimes  left  uncared  for,  the  composi- 
tion is  at  times  a  little  awkward  or  a  little  con- 
ventional. But  he  has  feeling,  both  poetical  feeling 
and  feeling  for  reality,  all  through  his  work,  even 
when  he  is  least  concentrated ;  and  at  his  best  he 
anticipates  Murillo,  not  unworthily,  in  what  is 
after  all  only  a  part  of  his  originahty.  In  the 
Martyrdom  of  Saint  Andrew,  in  the  Museo,  he  is 
a  realist ;  life  abounds  in  those  sturdy,  deeply 
coloured  figures,  who  work  or  watch  so  earnestly, 
with  so  little  sense  of  the  spectator.  In  the  Death 
of  S.  Isidore,  in  the  church  dedicated  to  that  Saint, 
the  earnest,  homely,  expressive  people  who  stand 
about  the  dying  Saint  are  thoroughly  Spanish  people, 
and  they  are  absorbed  in  what  is  happening;  not, 
as  in  the  Pieta  of  Luis  de  Vargas,  in  what  we  are 
thinking  of  them.  And  this  group  on  earth  melts 
imperceptibly,  almost  in  the  manner  which  is  to 
be  Murillo's,  into  a  heavenly  group,  lifted  on 
vague,  lighted  clouds :  child  angels,  and  angelic 
youths,  singing  and  playing  on  guitars,  and  above, 

37 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Christ   and   Mary,   who  wait  with   crowns   of  gold 
and    flowers,    and    calm    angels    at    their    side.     In 
one    section    of    an    altar-piece    in    the    University 
Church,  the  Blessing  of  the  Infant  Christ,  the  same 
elegant,   softly   coloured   figures   bring  in  the  same 
celestial    gaiety,    in    these    flights    of    singing    and 
playing  angels  with  harp,  viola,  and  guitar,  out  of 
a  golden  open  heaven,   a   cloud  of  delicate  young 
faces.     And   in   the   picture   of  St.   Anne    and   the 
Virgin,   in   the   Museo,   there   is   a   singular    gentle- 
ness and  repose,  certainly  more  Itahan  than  Spanish. 
The   Virgin    kneels    at    her    mother's    side    reading 
out  of  a  book,  doubtless  the  prophecy  of  her  own 
honour.     She  is   crowned  with   a  jewelled   coronet, 
over  the  flower  in  her  hair,  and  wears  many  rings 
and    jewelled    bracelets,    and    pearls    sewn    in    the 
border  of  her   dress;     St.   Anne,    after  the   fashion 
of  Seville,  wearing  many  shawls,  of  diflFerent  colours. 
Angels   crowd   the   space   above  them,   looking  out 
of  warm  clouds,  as  Murillo's  are  to  look,  but  with 
less  of  his  celestial  atmosphere,  less  power  of  dis- 
tinguishing vision,   in  painting,   from   real  life.     In 
front    of    St.    Anne's    chair,    over    which    hangs    a 
crimson  curtain,  is  a  httle  cabinet,  the  drawer  open, 
showing   linen    and   lace;     a    dog    and    cat,    a   very 
natural    cat,    lie    together    in    front,    with    a    work- 
basket  near  them.     I  find  myself  tiring  a  Httle  of 
Roelas,   as  I   see  picture  after  picture  representing 
incidents  in  the  Hves  of  the  Saints,  always  capably, 
with  natural  sentiment  and  natural  grace,  but  rarely 
with  any  great  intensity;   here,  in  what  is  after  all 
38 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

his  exceptional  manner,  and  a  manner  which  gave 
offence  to  his  contemporaries,  notably  Pacheco, 
from  the  naive  intimacy  of  its  detail,  he  paints  a 
placid  scene  with  a  full  sense  of  its  beauty  and  of 
its  beautiful  opportunities. 

One  of  the  compartments  of  the  altar-piece  in 
the  University  Church,  an  Adoration  of  the  Shep- 
herds, by  Francisco  Varela,  a  pupil  of  Roelas, 
shows  the  influence  of  Roelas  on  a  more  sombre 
nature.  It  is  singularly  original  in  its  effects  of 
hght  and  shadow :  the  stormy  background,  middle 
darkness  and  sudden  hght  above  the  manger 
roofed  with  a  brood  of  angels.  There  is  both 
reahsm  and  a  sense  of  beauty  in  the  earnest  group 
in  the  foreground,  the  Andalusian  shepherd  with 
a  lamb  on  his  shoulders,  the  inexpHcable  woman, 
half  undraped  and  half  in  armour,  who  presents  a 
book  of  music  to  the  laughing  child.  Another 
and  more  famous  follower  of  Roelas,  Francisco 
Herrera,  scarcely  chooses  what  is  best  in  his  master 
to  imitate,  in  his  "furious,"  too  vehemently  Spanish 
way.  There  are  two  huge  pictures  of  Herrera 
in  the  Museo,  one  on  each  side  of  the  Martyrdom 
of  Saint  Andrew;  in  the  earher  of  the  two,  the 
St.  Hermengild,  vigorous  as  it  is,  the  sincerity  and 
simplicity  of  Roelas  have  already  gone,  the  Saint 
is  an  operatic  tenor,  every  figure  poses;  in  the 
later,  St.  Basil,  all  is  splash-work,  extravagant 
contortion,  and  hectic  light  and  shadow. 

It   was   from   Herrera   that   Velasquez  took   his 
first  lessons,  before  he  became  the  pupil  of  Francisco 

39 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Pacheco,  an  Italianised  painter,  whose  series  of 
pictures  in  the  Museo,  the  Legend  of  S.  Pedro 
Nolasco,  has  at  least  a  certain  quietude,  flat,  almost 
colourless  though  they  are.  Pacheco  was  a  better 
writer  than  painter,  and  his  Arte  de  Pintura,  pub- 
lished at  Seville  in  1646,  is  full  of  interesting  theory 
and  detail.  He  is  a  strict  traditionalist,  and  finds 
a  religious  basis  for  the  colours  of  pictures,  the 
position  of  Saints  in  them,  and  reasons  of  "the 
different  kinds  of  nobility  that  accompany  the  art 
of  painting,  and  of  its  universal  utility."  He 
was  chosen  by  the  Inquisition  as  censor  of  pictures, 
an  office  which  he  held  with  more  impartiality 
than  some  of  his  theories  would  seem  to  imply. 
He  even  learnt  to  put  a  certain  naivete  which  is 
almost  naturalness  into  his  later  pictures,  perhaps 
from  the  example  of  his  pupil,  of  whose  virtudy 
limpieza  y  huenas  partes,  y  de  las  esperanzas  de  su 
natural  y  grande  ingenio  he  speaks  with  such  hearty 
enthusiasm;  finding  in  "his  glory  the  crown  of 
my  later  years."  Pacheco's  pictures  in  the  Museo 
gain  from  their  position,  for  by  their  side  are  the 
coloured  lithographs  of  Juan  de  Castillo,  the  master 
of  Murillo,  and  one  of  the  worst  painters  who 
ever  lived.  Alonso  Cano,  architect,  sculptor,  and 
painter,  who  studied  under  Montanes  and  Pacheco, 
has  been  admirably  defined  by  Lord  Leighton  as 
"an  eclectic  with  a  Spanish  accent."  There  are 
many  of  his  charming,  facile  pictures  in  Seville ; 
and  in  one  of  them,  the  Purgatory  in  the  Museo, 
he  is  for  once  almost  wholly  Spanish,  as  he  is  in 
40 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

the  curious,  half  caricature  pictures  of  Visigothic 
Kings,  in  the  Prado  at  Madrid.  It  is  a  panel 
representing  souls  burning  in  red  flames ;  four 
men  and  two  children,  with  others  seen  shadowily, 
lifting  their  hands,  not  without  hope,  out  of  the 
burning.  It  is  a  simple,  dreadful  realisation  of  a 
dreadful  dogma;  it  gives,  without  criticism,  all 
the  cruelty  of  religion. 

Francisco  Zurbaran,  in  the  thirty  or  forty  pic- 
tures of  his  which  are  to  be  seen  in  Seville,  sums 
up  almost  everything  I  have  said  of  the  typical 
characteristics  of  Spanish  painting;  and  yet,  after 
all,  remains  a  passionate  mediocrity,  in  whom  I 
find  it  impossible  to  take  any  very  personal  interest. 
The  Museo  contains  three  of  his  largest,  most 
notable  pictures,  the  Virgin  de  las  Cuevas,  the 
Apotheosis  of  St.  Thomas  Aquinas,  and  the  Car- 
thusian Monks  at  Table ;  yet  even  in  these  pictures 
I  find  something  hard,  unsympathetic  in  his  touch, 
as  he  tells  his  story  so  adequately,  so  pointedly, 
and  with  singular  honesty  in  its  emphasis.  They 
have  all  his  solid,  uninspired  care  for  formal  outline 
and  expression,  expression  counting  for  so  much 
and  colour  for  so  little ;  though  the  Apotheosis 
has,  for  once,  caught  a  little  of  the  warmth  of 
Roelas,  of  whom  Zurbaran  was  a  visitor,  if  not  a 
pupil.  The  monks,  like  all  his  monks,  seem  to 
be  reflected  in  a  mirror  suddenly  placed  in  their 
cell  or  refectory ;  they  have  the  very  attitude  of 
life,  letting  something  of  a  burning  inner  life  come 
through  into  their  faces ;   and  yet,  on  these  canvases 

41 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

without  atmosphere,  they  are  not  ahve.  Zurbaran 
achieves  reahsm  without  attaining  Ufe.  He  shows 
us  people,  copied  from  hfe,  in  whom  we  discern  a 
brooding  emotion ;  but  he  paints  them  without 
emotion.  His  severe  and  lady-hke  Saints  in  the 
Hospital  Civil,  in  their  fantastic  dresses,  with  their 
fixed  air  of  meditation,  are  Kke  Gothic  statues  painted 
upon  canvas.  When  he  aims  at  an  emotional 
rendering  of  emotion,  a  very  Spanish  kind  of  in- 
sincerity comes  in,  and  he  paints  pictures  like  the 
extravagant  female  saint  in  the  Sacristia  Mayor, 
seated  in  a  false  ecstasy  before  a  book  and  a  skull. 
His  Crucifixions,  in  which  a  certain  intensity  finds 
precisely  the  motive  which  it  can  render  with  all 
the  hard,  motionless  truth  of  his  natural  manner, 
are  scarcely  to  be  called  extravagant,  if  the  horror 
of  that  death  is  to  be  painted  at  all.  Here  the 
painter  of  monks  puts  into  his  canvas  for  once  a 
kind  of  desperate  religious  ecstasy. 

There  is  something  of  the  spirit  and  manner  of 
Zurbaran  in  the  early  realistic  pictures  of  Murillo, 
in  the  San  Leandro  and  San  Bonaventura  of  the 
Museo,  for  instance.  Another  early  picture,  an 
An7iu7iciation,  painted  in  the  estilo  frio,  shows  us  a 
precisely  Sevillan  type  in  the  almost  piquant  Virgin, 
black-haired,  and  with  the  acute  hard  eyes  of 
Spanish  women.  In  an  Adoration  of  the  Shepherds 
in  the  Museo,  the  dark  young  shepherd,  who  has 
come  first  to  the  manger,  looks  at  the  divine  child 
with  a  frank,  unrestrained,  delightfully  natural 
curiosity,  fairly  open-mouthed,  with  the  honest 
42 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

peasant  stare  of  amazement.  In  the  Last  Supper^ 
in  Santa  Maria  la  Blanca,  with  its  passionate  energy 
of  characterisation,  Murillo  is  almost  purely  realistic, 
realising  the  scene,  certainly,  with  perfect  natural- 
ness. But  from  the  beginning,  and  through  all 
his  changes,  his  pictures  hve.  There  is  not  an 
example  in  Seville  of  what  is  most  familiar  to  us  in 
his  work,  the  genre  pictures,  the  somewhat  idealised 
beggar-boys.  But,  with  this  scarcely  important 
exception,  we  see  in  Seville,  and  we  can  see  only  in 
Seville,  all  that  it  is  important  to  us  to  see  of  his 
work.  Among  the  six  pictures  which  still  hang 
in  the  places  for  which  they  were  painted,  in  the 
church  of  that  Hospital  de  la  Caridad  founded  by 
Don  Miguel  Mariara,  the  original  Don  Juan,  as 
it  is  thought  by  many,  are  the  large  compositions, 
La  Sed,  and  the  Paji  y  Feces,  in  which  Murillo 
shows  his  mastery  of  the  drama  of  a  large  can- 
vas, in  which  many  human  figures  move  and 
group  themselves  in  a  broad  landscape.  In  the 
Museo  there  are  twenty-three  pictures,  and 
among  them  the  great  Capuchin  series ;  in  the 
Baptistery  of  the  Cathedral  there  is  the  St.  Antho7iy 
of  Padua;  and  elsewhere,  in  churches,  convents, 
and  private  collections,  I  know  not  how  many 
further  pictures,  sometimes,  like  the  Last  Supper 
in  Santa  Maria  la  Blanca,  painfully  darkened, 
sometimes  no  more  than  a  Christ  painted  rapidly 
on  a  wooden  crucifix  for  a  friendly  monk.  But 
in  all  these  pictures,  so  unequal,  and  only  gradually 
attaining   a  completely  personal   mastery  of  style, 

43 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

there  is  the  very  energy  of  Hfe,  Spanish  hfe,  burning 
at  the  points  of  its  greatest  intensity. 

In  Murillo  the  Spanish  extravagance  turns  to 
sweetness,  a  sweetness  not  always  to  our  taste, 
but  genuine,  national,  and  perfectly  embodied  in 
those  pictures  in  which  he  has  painted  ecstasy  as 
no  one  else  has  ever  painted  it.  In  the  warm, 
mellow,  not  bright  or  gHttering  light  of  the  St. 
Anthony  of  Padua,  vision  sweeps  back  the  walls 
as  if  a  curtain  had  been  drawn  aside  before  the 
kneehng  monk,  and  the  glory  is  upon  him :  the 
child,  in  all  the  radiance  of  divine  infancy,  as  if 
leaping  on  clouds  of  golden  fire,  and  about  him  a 
swirling  circle  of  little  angels,  burning  upwards  to 
a  brighter  ardency,  as  if  the  highest  point  of  their 
circle  were  lit  by  the  nearer  light  of  heaven.  His 
colour,  in  these  ecstatic  pictures,  is  a  colour  one 
can  fancy  really  that  of  joyous  clouds  about  the 
gates  of  heaven,  jewelled  for  the  feet  of  Saints. 
And  the  little  angels  really  fly,  though  they  are 
otherwise  perfectly  human,  and  of  the  earth.  The 
Virgin,  too,  has  all  the  humanity  of  a  young  mother, 
as  she  leans  out  of  embowering  clouds,  or  treads 
on  the  globe  of  the  earth,  which  whitens  under  her 
among     drifting     worlds.     She     is     Fray     Luis     de 


Leon'j 


Virgen  del  sol  vesiida 

De  luces  eternales  coronada, 

Slue  huellas  con  divinos  pies  la  luna. 


and   yet   her  gestures   are   full   of  human  warmth; 
she  lives  there,  certainly,   as  vividly,   and  with  as 

44 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

much  earthly  remembrance,  as  at  any  time  on  the 
earth. 

The  emotion  of  Murillo,  in  these  pictures,  is 
the  emotion  of  the  Spaniard  as  it  turns  passionately 
to  religion.  In  such  a  picture  as  his  own  favourite, 
St.  Thomas  of  Villanueva  giving  alms,  he  has  created 
for  us  on  the  canvas  a  supreme  embodiment  of  what 
is  so  large  a  part  of  religion  in  Spain,  the  grace  and 
virtue  of  almsgiving,  with  the  whole  sympathetic 
contrast  of  Spanish  life  emphasised  sharply  in  the 
admirable,  pitying  grace  of  the  Saint,  and  the 
swarming  misery  of  the  beggars.  In  such  others 
as  St.  Francis  by  the  Cross  and  the  St.  Anthony 
of  the  Museo,  we  are  carried  to  a  further  point, 
in  which  practical  religion  becomes  mysticism,  a 
mysticism  akin  to  that  of  St.  John  of  the  Cross, 
in  which  the  devout  soul  swoons  "among  the 
lilies."  This  mysticism  finds  its  expression  in 
these  rapt  canvases,  in  the  abandonment  of  these 
nervous,  feminine  Saints  to  the  sweetness  of  asceti- 
cism, in  one  to  the  luxury  of  supreme  sorrow,  in 
the  other  to  the  ecstasy  of  the  divine  childhood. 
It  is  precisely  because  these  Saints  of  Murillo 
abandon  themselves  so  unthinkingly,  with  so  Spanish 
an  abandonment,  to  their  mystical  contemplation, 
that  they  may  seem  to  us,  with  our  Northern  senti- 
ment of  restraint,  to  pose  a  little.  In  desert  places, 
among  dimly  lighted  clouds,  that  rise  about  them 
in  waves  of  visible  darkness,  they  are  dreamers 
who  have  actualised  their  dreams,  mystics  who, 
by  force  of  passionate  contemplation,  have  attained 

45 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

the  reality  of  their  vision ;  and  the  very  real  forms 
at  which  they  gaze  are  but  evocations  which  have 
arisen  out  of  those  mists  and  taken  shape  before 
their  closed  or  open  eyes.  And  indeed  in  these 
pictures,  in  which  the  Virgin  appears  in  a  burst  of 
sunlight  out  of  the  darkness,  treading  on  the  dim 
world  and  the  crescent  moon,  or  in  which  the 
Trinity  flashes  itself  upon  St.  Augustine  as  he 
writes,  or  in  which  Christ  comes  back  to  the  cross 
for  the  sake  of  St.  Francis  or  to  the  cradle  for  St. 
Anthony,  all  is  vision,  vision  creating  vision;  and 
the  humanity  in  them  is  so  real,  because  it  is  so 
powerfully  evoked.  Thought  out  of  the  void, 
with  such  another  energy  as  that  with  which  Rem- 
brandt thought  his  visions,  more  real  than  reality, 
out  of  burning  darkness,  these  rise  out  of  a  softer 
shadow,  through  which  the  light  breaks  flower- 
like, or  as  if  it  sang  aloud. 

To  turn  from  Murillo  to  Valdes  Leal  is  like 
passing  from  the  service  of  the  Mass  in  a  cathedral 
to  a  representation  of  Mass  in  a  theatre.  He  paints, 
indeed,  effectively,  but  always  for  efi^ect.  His 
painting  is  superficial,  and  has  the  tricks  of  modern 
French  painters.  Shadowy  figures  float  in  the  air, 
apparitions  seen  as  the  vulgar  conceive  them,  as 
insubstantial  things ;  showy,  dressy  women  parade 
in  modern  clothes ;  worldly  angels  twist  in  elegant 
attitudes,  the  same  attitude  repeated  in  two  pictures. 
Even  the  picture  of  St.  John  leading  the  three 
Maries  to  Calvary,  which  has  movement,  and  may 
at  first  seem  to  have  simple  movement,  does  not 

46 


The  Painters  of  Seville. 

bear  too  close  a  scrutiny  :  the  figures  grow  conscious 
as  one  looks  at  them.  Drama  has  become  theatrical, 
and  his  St.  Jerome  in  the  wilderness,  flinging  his 
arms  half  across  the  canvas,  with  the  French  ladies 
about  him,  and  a  thunderstorm  in  the  distance,  is 
far  indeed  from  the  honest  dramatic  sense  of  Roelas. 
He  is  expressive,  certainly,  but  he  would  express 
too  much,  and  with  too  little  conviction.  In  his 
altar-piece  in  the  church  of  the  Carmen  at  Cordova, 
done  before  he  came  to  Seville,  an  immense  picture 
in  eleven  compartments,  architecturally  arranged, 
giving  the  history  of  Elijah,  there  is  a  certain 
absorption  in  his  subject,  which  gives  him,  indeed, 
opportunities  for  his  too  theatrical  qualities,  fire 
breaking  out  of  the  wheels  of  the  chariot  and  the 
manes  and  tails  of  the  horses,  and  out  of  the  sword 
with  which  Elijah  has  slain  the  prophets  of  Baal. 
He  did  not  again  achieve  so  near  an  approach  to 
spontaneity  in  extravagance.  In  his  two  famous 
pictures  in  the  Caridad,  at  which  Murillo  is  said 
to  have  held  his  nose,  the  Spanish  macabre  is  carried 
to  its  utmost  limits.  In  one  a  skeleton  with  one 
foot  on  the  globe  tramples  on  all  the  arts  and  in- 
ventions of  man ;  the  picture  is  inscribed  In  ictu 
oculi.  In  the  other  a  rotting  bishop  Hes  in  his 
broken  coflfin  by  the  side  of  a  rotting  knight,  in  a 
red  and  gloomy  darkness ;  the  picture  is  inscribed 
Finis  glories  mundi.  Both  are  horribly  impressive, 
painted  brilliantly,  and  with  an  almost  literally 
overpowering  vigour.  They  lead  the  way  to  other, 
feebler,  later  pictures,  some  of  which  may  be  seen 

47 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

in  a  side  room  at  the  Museo,  where,  for  instance,  a 
man  in  a  black  cloak  contemplates  a  crowned  skull 
which  he  holds  in  his  hands,  while  a  cardinal's  red 
hat  lies  at  his  feet.  Here  Spanish  painting,  losing 
all  its  earnestness  and  simplicity,  in  its  representa- 
tion of  human  life  or  of  religious  ecstasy,  losing 
direction  for  its  vigour,  losing  the  very  qualities 
of  painting,  becomes  moralising,  becomes  em- 
blematical, dying  in  Seville  a  characteristic  death. 

Winter,  1899. 


48 


Domenico   Theotocopuli: 
A  Study  at  Toledo. 

An  entry  in  the  books  of  the  church  of  Santo  Tome 
at  Toledo,  recently  discovered,  tells  us  that  Do- 
menico Theotocopuli  died  on  April  7,  1614,  and 
was  buried  in  the  church  of  Santo  Domingo  el 
Antiguo  :  En  siete  del  Abril  1614,  falescio  Dominico 
Greco.  No  hizo  testamentOy  recibio  los  sacramentoSy 
enterose  en  Santo  Domingo  el  Antiguo.  Dio  velas. 
The  signature  to  a  picture  in  the  Escurial  tells  us 
that  he  came  from  Crete.  We  do  not  know  the 
date  of  his  birth ;  we  are  told  that  he  studied  at 
Venice  under  Titian;  the  earhest  date  which 
connects  him  with  Toledo  is  1577,  when  the  chapter 
of  the  cathedral  ordered  from  him  the  Disrobing 
of  Christy  now  in  the  sacristy.  He  is  said  to  have 
been  not  only  a  painter,  a  sculptor,  and  an  architect, 
but  to  have  written  on  art  and  philosophy ;  he  was 
a  fierce  litigant  on  behalf  of  his  art  and  his  own 
dignity  as  an  artist ;  we  are  told  of  his  petulance 
in  speech,  as  in  the  assertion  that  Michel  Angelo 
could  not  paint;  there  are  legends  of  his  pride, 
ostentation,  and  dehberate  eccentricity,  of  his  wealth, 
of  his  supposed  madness ;  Gongora  wrote  a  sonnet 
on  his  death,  and  Felix  de  Artiaga  two  sonnets  on 
his  own  portrait  and  on  the  monument  to  Queen 
Margarita.  The  poet  addresses  him  as  Divino 
Griego  and  Milagro  Griego;  but  the  name  by  which 
he  was  generally  known  is  the  half-Spanish,  half- 
ItaUan  name.  El  Greco.  One  of  the  most  original 
painters  who  ever  lived,   he  was   almost  forgotten 

49 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

until  the  present  century  ;  the  unauthenticated  story 
of  his  madness  is  still  commonly  repeated,  not  only 
by  the  sacristans  of  Toledo,  and  it  is  only  quite  lately 
that  there  has  been  any  attempt  to  take  him  seriously, 
to  consider  his  real  position  in  the  history  of  art  and 
his  real  value  as  a  painter.  What  follows  is  a  per- 
sonal impression  of  those  aspects  of  his  work  and 
temperament  which  I  was  able  to  note  for  myself 
in  a  careful  study  of  his  pictures  in  Spain,  and 
chiefly  of  those   at  Toledo   and    Madrid. 

Theotocopuli  seems  to  have  discovered  art  over 
again  for  himself,  and  in  a  way  which  will  suggest 
their  varying  ways  to  some  of  the  most  typical 
modern  painters.  And,  indeed,  I  think  he  did 
discover  his  art  over  again  from  the  beginning, 
setting  himself  to  the  problem  of  the  representation 
of  life  and  vision,  of  the  real  world  and  the  spiritual 
world,  as  if  no  one  had  ever  painted  before.  Perhaps 
it  is  rather,  as  the  legends  tell  us,  with  an  only  too 
jealous  consciousness  of  what  had  been  done,  and 
especially  by  Titian,  whose  pupil  he  is  said  to  have 
been,  and  whose  work  his  earliest  pictures  done 
in  Spain  are  said  to  have  resembled  so  closely  that 
the  one  might  actually  have  been  mistaken  for  the 
other.  Real  originality  is  often  deliberate  origi- 
nality, and  though  the  story  is  scarcely  true,  and 
though  it  was  no  doubt  Tintoretto  and  not  Titian 
whom  he  studied  under,  I  should  have  seen  no 
injustice  to  Theotocopuli  in  accepting  the  story. 
What  it  means  chiefly  is,  that  he  saw  a  problem 
before  him,  considered  it  carefully  on  every  side, 
50 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 


and  found  out  for  himself  what  was  his  own  way 
of  solving  it. 

He  goes  back,  then,  frankly,  to  first  principles : 
how  one  personally  sees  colour,  form,  the  way  in 
which  one  remembers  expression,  one's  own  natural 
way  of  looking  at  things.  And  he  chooses,  out  of 
all  the  world  of  colour,  those  five  which  we  see  on 
his  palette  in  his  portrait  of  himself  at  Seville,  white, 
vermilion,  lake,  yellow  ochre,  and  ivory  black,  with, 
here  as  elsewhere,  a  careful  limitation  of  himself 
to  what  he  has  chosen  naturally  out  of  the  things 
open  to  his  choice :  style,  that  is,  sternly  appre- 
hended as  the  man. 

And  he  has  come,  we  may  suppose,  to  look  on 
human  things  somewhat  austerely,  with  a  certain 
contempt  for  the  facile  joys  and  fresh  carnations  of 
life,  as  he  has  for  the  poses  and  colours  of  those 
painters  of  life  who  have  seen  life  differently ;  for, 
even,  Titian's  luxurious  loitering  beside  sumptuous 
flesh  in  pleasant  gardens,  and  for  the  voluptuous 
joy  of  his  colour.  He  wants  to  express  another 
kind  of  world,  in  which  life  is  chilled  into  a  con- 
tinual proud  meditation,  in  which  thought  is  more 
than  action,  and  in  which  the  flesh  is  but  Httle 
indulged.  He  sees  almost  the  spiritual  body,  in 
his  search  beyond  the  mere  humanity  of  white  and 
red,  the  world's  part  of  coloured  dresses,  the  attitudes 
of  the  sensual  life.  Emotion  is  somewhat  dried 
out  of  him,  and  he  intellectualises  the  warmth  of 
life  until  it  becomes  at  times  the  spectre  of  a  thought, 
which  has  taken  visible  form,  somewhat  alarmingly. 

51 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

And  Toledo,  too,  has  had  its  influence  upon 
him,  an  influence  scarcely  to  be  exaggerated  in  the 
formation  of  his  mind.  TheotocopuH,  it  seems  to 
me,  is  not  to  be  understood  apart  from  Toledo,  the 
place  to  which  a  natural  affinity  brought  him,  the 
place  which  was  waiting  to  develop  just  his  particular 
originality.  Toledo  is  one  of  the  most  individual 
cities  in  Europe.  It  is  set  on  a  high  and  bare  rock, 
above  a  river  broken  by  sounding  weirs,  in  the 
midst  of  a  sombre  and  rocky  land.  With  its  high, 
windowless  walls,  which  keep  their  own  secrets, 
its  ascents  and  descents  through  narrow  passage- 
ways between  miles  of  twisting  grey  stone,  it  seems 
to  be  encrusted  upon  the  rock,  like  a  fantastic 
natural  product ;  and  it  is  at  the  same  time  a  museum 
of  all  the  arts  which  have  left  their  mark  upon 
Europe.  Almost  the  best  Moorish  art  is  to  be 
seen  there,  mingled  with  much  excellent  Christian 
art ;  and  the  mingling,  in  this  strange  place,  which 
has  kept  its  Arab  virginity  while  accepting  every 
ornament  which  its  Christian  conquerors  have 
offered  it,  is  for  once  perfectly  successful.  Winter 
and  summer  fall  upon  it,  set  thus  naked  on  a 
high  rock,  with  all  their  violence;  even  in  spring 
the  white  streets  burn  like  furnaces,  wherever  a 
little  space  is  left  unshaded ;  the  air  is  parching, 
the  dust  rises  in  a  fine  white  cloud.  Walk  long 
enough,  down  descending  paths,  until  you  hear  the 
sound  of  rushing  water,  and  you  come  out  on  a 
crumbling  edge  of  land,  going  down  precipitously, 
with  its  cargo  of  refuse,  into  the  Tagus,  or  upon 

52 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 

one  of  the  sharply  turning  roads  which  lead  down- 
wards in  a  series  of  incUned  planes.  On  the  other 
side  of  the  ravine  another  hill  rises,  here  abrupt 
grey  rock,  there  shaded  to  an  infinitely  faint  green, 
which  covers  the  grey  rock  hke  a  transparent 
garment.  Every  turn,  which  leads  you  to  the 
surprise  of  the  precipice,  has  its  own  surprise  for 
you ;  there  seem  to  be  more  churches  than  houses, 
and  every  church  has  its  own  originality,  or  it  may 
be,  its  own  series  of  originalities.  If  it  had  none 
of  its  churches,  if  it  were  a  mere  huddle  of  white 
and  windowless  Arab  houses,  like  Elche,  which  it 
somewhat  resembles,  Toledo  would  still  be,  from 
its  mere  poise  there  on  its  desert  rock,  one  of  the 
most  picturesque  places  in  Spain.  As  it  is,  every 
stone  which  goes  to  make  its  strange,  penetrating 
originality  of  aspect,  has  its  history  and  possesses 
its  own  various  beauty.  To  Theotocopuh,  coming 
to  this  austere  and  chill  and  burning  city  of  living 
rock  from  the  languid  waters  of  Venice,  a  new  world 
was  opened,  the  world  of  what  is  most  essentially 
and  yet  exceptionally  Spanish,  as  it  can  appeal, 
with  all  its  strength,  only  to  strangers.  Toledo 
made  Theotocopuh  Spanish,  more  Spanish  than  the 
Spaniards. 

And  Toledo  was  surely  not  without  its  influence 
in  the  suggestion  of  that  new  system  of  colour, 
teaching  him,  as  it  certainly  would,  to  appreciate 
colour  in  what  is  cold,  grey,  austere,  without 
luxuriance  or  visible  brightness.  The  colour 
of    Toledo    is    marvellously    sharp     and     dim     at 

53 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

once,  with  an  incomparable  richness  in  all  the 
shades  to  which  stone  can  lend  itself  under 
weather,  and  in  sun  and  shadow;  it  is  a  colour 
violently  repressed,  a  thing  to  be  divined,  waited 
upon,  seen  with  intelligence.  It  is  amply  defended 
against  indifferent  eyes :  it  shocks,  and  is  subtle, 
two  defences ;  but  there  it  is,  the  colour  of  Theo- 
tocopuli. 

In  the  Museo  Provincial  there  is  a  bird's-eye  view 
of  Toledo  by  Theotocopuh  which  is  the  most  fan- 
tastic landscape  I  have  ever  seen,  like  a  glimpse  of 
country  seen  in  a  nightmare,  and  yet,  somehow,  very 
like  a  real  Toledo.  It  is  done  with  a  sweeping 
brush,  with  mere  indications,  in  these  bluish  white 
houses  which  rush  headlong  downhill  and  struggle 
wildly  uphill,  from  the  phantom  Tagus  below  to 
the  rushing  storm-sky  above.  The  general  tone 
is  pale  earthy  green,  colouring  the  hills  on  which 
the  city  rests,  and  intersecting  the  streets  of  pale 
houses,  and  running  almost  without  a  break  into 
the  costume  of  the  youth  in  the  foreground,  who 
holds  a  map  of  the  city  in  his  hands,  fiUing  a  huge 
space  of  the  picture.  Toledo  itself  is  grey  and 
green,  especially  as  night  comes  on  over  the  country, 
and  the  rocks  and  fields  colour  faintly  under  the 
sunset,  the  severity  of  their  beauty  a  little  softened 
by  a  natural  effect  which  is  like  an  effect  in  painting. 
It  is  just  the  effect  of  this  phantasmal  landscape; 
and,  here  again,  all  Toledo  is  in  the  work  of  Theoto- 
copuh, and  his  work  all  Toledo.  Coming  out  from 
seeing  his  pictures  in  some  vast,  old,  yellow  church, 

54 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 

into  these  never  quite  natural  or  lifelike  streets, 
where  blind  beggars  play  exquisitely  on  their  guitars 
in  the  shadow  of  a  doorway,  and  children  go  barefoot, 
with  flowers  in  their  mouths,  leading  pet  lambs, 
I  seem  to  find  his  models  everywhere  :  these  dark 
peasants  with  their  sympathetic  and  bright  serious- 
ness, the  women  who  wear  his  colours,  the  men 
who  sit  in  the  cafes  with  exactly  that  lean  diminishing 
outline  of  face  and  beard,  that  sallow  skin,  and  those 
fixed  eyes. 

In  his  portraits,  as  we  see  them  for  the  most 
part  in  the  Prado  at  Madrid,  there  is  a  certain 
subdued  ecstasy,  purely  ascetic,  and  purely  tempera- 
mental in  its  asceticism,  as  of  a  fine  Toledo  blade, 
wearing  out  its  scabbard  through  the  mere  sharpness 
of  inaction.  There  is  a  kind  of  family  likeness,  a 
likeness,  too,  with  his  own  face,  in  these  portraits 
of  Spanish  gentlemen,  in  the  black  clothes  and 
enveloping  white  ruff"  of  the  period  :  the  lean  face, 
pointed  beard,  deep  eyes,  thin  hair,  olive  skin,  the 
look  of  melancholy  pride.  Seen  at  a  little  distance, 
the  black  clothes  disappear  into  the  black  back- 
ground ;  nothing  is  seen  but  the  eager  face  starting 
out  of  the  white  ruff",  like  a  decapitated  head  seen 
in  a  dream.  Their  faces  are  all  nerves,  distinguished 
nerves,  quieted  by  an  eff"ort,  the  faces  of  dreamers 
in  action ;  they  have  all  the  brooding  Spanish  soul, 
with  its  proud  self-repression.  And  they  live  with 
an  eager,  remote,  perfectly  well-bred  life,  as  of  people 
who  could  never  be  taken  unawares,  in  a  vulgar  or 
trivial  moment.     In  their  tense,  intellectual  aspect 

55 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

there    is    all   the    romantic   sobriety    of   the    frugal 
Spanish  nature. 

Look  for  instance  at  the  portrait  of  the  man  with 
a  sword,  his  hand  laid  across  his  breast  with  a 
gesture  of  the  same  curious  fixity  as  the  eyes. 
Compare  this  portrait  with  the  fine  portrait  by  the 
pupil  of  Theotocopuli,  Luis  Tristan,  through  whom 
we  are  supposed  to  reach  Velasquez.  In  Tristan 
there  is  more  realism,  a  more  normal  flesh;  there 
is  none  of  that  spiritual  delicacy,  by  which  the  colours 
of  the  flesh  are  dimmed,  as  if  refined  away  by  the 
fretting  and  consuming  spirit.  In  the  portrait  by 
Theotocopuli,  the  light  falls  whitely  upon  the  man's 
forehead,  isolating  him  within  a  visionary  atmos- 
phere, in  which  he  lives  the  mysterious  hfe  of  a 
portrait.  He  exists  there,  as  if  sucked  out  of  the 
darkness  by  the  pale  light  which  illuminates  his 
forehead,  a  soul  and  a  gesture,  a  secret  soul  and  a 
repressive  gesture. 

And  these  portraits  are  painted  with  all  the 
economical  modern  mastery  of  means,  with  almost 
as  black  and  hard  an  outline  as  Manet,  with  strong 
shadows  and  significant  indications  of  outline,  with 
rapid  suppressions,  translations  of  colour  by  colour, 
decomposition  of  tones,  as  in  the  beautiful  lilacs 
of  the  white  flesh.  Individuality  is  pushed  to  a 
mannerism,  but  it  is  a  mannerism  which  renders  a 
very  select  and  vivid  aspect  of  natural  truth,  and  with 
a  virile  and  singular  kind  of  beauty. 

In  the  earliest  pictures  painted  under  the  influence 
of  the  Venetian  painters,  as  in  the  Disrobing  of 
56 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 

Christ  in  the  sacristy  of  the  cathedral  at  Toledo, 
there  is  a  perfect  mastery  of  form  and  colour,  as 
the  Venetians  understood  them;  the  composition  is 
well  balanced,  sober,  without  extravagance.  In  the 
Assumptiofi  of  the  Firgin,  over  the  high  altar  of 
Santo  Domingo  el  Antiguo,  there  is  just  a  suggestion 
of  the  hard  black  and  white  of  the  later  manner, 
but  for  the  most  part  it  is  painted  flowingly,  with  a 
vigour  always  conscious  of  tradition.  A  Virgin  of 
splendid  humanity  reminds  me  of  one  of  the  finest 
of  Alonso  Cano's  wooden  statues.  The  somewhat 
fiercely  meditative  saints  in  the  side  panels  are  at 
once  Spanish  and  Italian ;  Italian  by  their  formal 
qualities  of  painting,  certainly  Spanish  by  an  in- 
tensity of  religious  ardour  which  recalls  and  excels 
Zurbaran.  In  the  Adoration  of  the  Shepherds  and 
the  Resurrection,  in  the  same  church,  we  see  already 
sharp  darknesses  of  colour,  an  earthly  pallor  of  flesh, 
a  sort  of  turbulence  flushing  out  of  the  night  of  a 
black  background.  In  the  latter  picture  there  is  on 
one  side  a  priest,  finely  and  soberly  painted  in  his 
vestments  of  white  and  pale  gold ;  and,  on  the  other, 
almost  Blake-hke  figures  asleep  in  attitudes  of 
violent  repose,  or  rising  suddenly  with  hands  held 
up  against  the  dazzling  hght  which  breaks  from 
the  rising  Saviour.  But  it  is  in  the  Martyrdom  of 
S.  Maurizio,  ordered  by  Philip  II,  as  an  altar-piece 
for  the  Escurial,  and  refused  by  him  when  it  had 
been  painted,  that  we  see  the  complete  abandonment 
of  warm  for  cold  colouring,  the  first  definite  search 
for  a  wholly  personal  manner.     Is  it  that  he  has 

57 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

not  yet  assimilated  his  new  manner  ?  for  the  picture 
seems  to  me  a  sort  of  challenge  to  himself  and  to  his 
critics,  an  experiment  done  too  consciously  to  be 
quite  sincere  or  quite  successful.  There  is  a  wild 
kind  of  beauty,  harshly  and  deUberately  unsym- 
pathetic, in  this  turbulent  angehc  host,  these  figures 
of  arbitrary  height,  placed  strangely,  their  anatomy 
so  carefully  outhned  under  clinging  draperies  of 
crude  blues  and  yellows,  their  skin  turned  livid 
under  some  ghastly  supernatural  light.  In  another 
picture  painted  for  the  Escurial,  and  now  to  be  seen 
there,  the  Dream  of  Philip  II.,  there  is  a  hell  which 
suggests  the  fierce  material  hells  of  Hieronymus 
van  Bosch :  a  huge,  fanged  mouth  wide  open,  the 
damned  seen  writhing  in  that  red  cavern,  a  lake  of 
flame  awaiting  them  beyond,  while  angels  fly  over- 
head, sainted  persons  in  rich  ecclesiastical  vestments 
kneel  below,  and  the  king,  dressed  in  black,  kneels 
at  the  side.  It  is  almost  a  vision  of  madness,  and 
is  as  if  the  tormented  brain  of  the  fanatic  who  built 
those  prison  walls  about  himself,  and  shut  himself 
living  into  a  tomb-like  cell,  and  dead  into  a  not 
more  tomb-hke  niche  in  a  crypt,  had  wrought  itself 
into  the  brain  of  the  painter;  who  would  indeed 
have  found  something  not  uncongenial  to  himself 
in  this  mountainous  place  of  dust  and  grey  granite, 
in  which  every  line  is  rigid,  every  colour  ashen,  in 
a  kind  of  stony  immobility  more  terrible  than  any 
other  of  the  images  of  death. 

It  was  only  three  years  after  the  painting  of  the 
Martyrdom  of  S.  Maurizio  that  TheotocopuU  painted 

58 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 

his  masterpiece,  the  Burial  of  the  Conde  de  Orgaz, 
which  was  ordered  by  the  Archbishop  of  Toledo 
for  the  tomb,  in  the  church  of  Santo  Tome,  of 
Gonzalo  Ruiz  de  Toledo,  Conde  de  Orgaz,  who 
had  died  in  the  thirteenth  century.  The  picture 
is  still  to  be  seen  there,  in  its  corner  of  the  little 
white  mosque-like  church,  where  one  comes  upon 
it  with  a  curious  sensation  of  surprise,  for  it  is  at 
once  as  real  and  as  ghostly  as  a  dream,  and  it 
reminds  one  of  nothing  one  has  ever  seen  before. 
The  picture,  as  it  takes  hold  upon  one,  first  of  all, 
by  a  scheme  of  colour  as  startling  as  the  harmonies 
of  Wagner  in  music,  seems  to  have  been  thought 
out  by  a  brain  for  once  wholly  original,  in  forgetful- 
ness  of  all  that  had  ever  been  done  in  painting.  Is 
it  that  reality,  and  the  embodied  forms  of  the 
imagination,  have  been  seen  thus,  at  a  fixed  angle, 
instinctively  and  deliberately,  for  a  picture,  by  an 
artist  to  whom  all  life  is  the  escaping  ghost  of  art  ? 
Certainly  its  austerity,  its  spiritual  realism,  its 
originality  of  composition,  so  simple  as  to  be 
startling,  and  of  colour,  the  reticence  of  a  passionate 
abnegation ;  the  tenderness  of  the  outHnes  of  the 
drooping  dead  body,  in  its  rich  armour ;  the  mas- 
culine seriousness  in  all  the  faces,  each  of  which  is 
hke  one  of  the  portraits  in  the  Prado,  and  with  all 
their  subtlety,  make  the  picture  one  of  the  master- 
pieces of  painting.  The  upper  part  is  a  celestial 
company,  arranged  so  as  to  drift  like  a  canopy  over 
the  death-scene  below ;  and  these  angels  are  painted 
in    swift    outline,    their   blue    and    yellow    draperies 

59 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

sweeping  the  vehement  clouds.  Below,  where  the 
warrior  is  dying,  and  his  friends,  with  their  dis- 
tinguished Castillian  faces,  their  black  clothes  which 
sink  into  the  shadow,  the  white  rufFs  about  their 
thin  faces  and  pointed  beards  standing  out  star- 
thngly,  crowd  about  him,  we  have  the  real  world,  in 
all  the  emphasis  of  its  contrast  to  the  spiritual 
world.  Every  face  lives  its  own  life,  there  on  the 
canvas,  assisting  at  this  death  as  an  actual  spectator, 
thinking  of  this  and  of  other  things,  not  as  a  merely 
useful  part  of  a  composition.  And  the  beauty  of 
beautiful  things  is  nowhere  neglected :  the  fine 
armour,  the  golden  and  embroidered  vestments  of 
the  bishop,  the  transparent  white  linen  of  the 
surplice  worn  by  the  tall  man  in  the  foreground, 
the  gracious  charm  of  the  young  priest  who  stoops 
over  the  dying  man.  The  chief  indication  of  what 
is  to  be  the  extravagant  later  manner  comes  out  in 
the  painting  of  the  hands,  with  their  sharp,  pained 
gesticulation,  to  which  nature  is  a  little  sacrificed. 
They  must  exclaim,  in  their  gesture. 

Madness,  it  has  commonly  been  supposed,  and 
will  still  be  told  you  by  all  the  sacristans  of  Toledo ; 
a  disease  of  the  eye,  as  it  is  now  thought ;  mere 
insistent  and  defiant  originality  of  search  after  w^hat 
was  new  and  powerfully  expressive,  as  it  may  well 
have  been ;  something,  certainly,  before  long  set 
Theotocopuli  chevauchant  hors  du  possible,  as  Gautier 
puts  it,  in  those  amazing  pictures  by  which  he  is 
chiefly  known,  the  religious  pictures  in  the  Prado 
at  Madrid,  in  the  churches  and  the  Hospital  a  fuera 
60 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 

at  Toledo,  and  in  some  galleries  and  private  collec- 
tions outside  Spain.  In  the  immense  retablo  of 
Santa  Clara,  with  its  six  large  and  four  small  panels, 
its  gilded  and  painted  statues,  the  sombre  splendour 
of  colour  begins  to  darken,  that  it  may  be  the  more 
austere;  the  forms  and  faces,  so  vigorous  in  St. 
Jerome,  so  beautiful  in  St.  Anne,  begin  to  harden 
a  Httle ;  but  as  yet  leanness  has  not  eaten  up  all, 
nor  a  devouring  energy  consumed  away  the  incidents 
of  the  drama  into  a  kind  of  spectral  reflection  of  it. 
In  the  Dead  Christ  in  the  Arms  of  God  the  Father , 
in  the  Prado,  energy  has  grown  eager  and  restless, 
as  the  divine  persons  are  seen  couched  upon  rolling 
white  clouds,  while  a  burst  of  golden  sunhght 
blazes  upon  the  great  white  wings  of  God.  In  the 
Ascension  near  it,  where  Christ  floats  upw^ards, 
carrying  a  white  banner,  while  the  soldiers  fall  about 
his  feet,  throwing  their  arms  and  swords  wildly 
into  the  air,  the  Hghts  seem  to  hurdle  to  and  fro, 
catching  the  tips  of  noses,  the  points  of  knees,  the 
hollows  of  breast-bones,  in  a  w^aste  of  clouds  and 
smoke.  In  the  Baptism  of  Christ,  the  anatomies 
grow  bonier  than  ever,  more  violently  distorted  by 
shadows,  as  a  green  and  blue  flood  pours  out  angels 
like  foam  about  the  feet  of  God  the  Father.  There 
is  a  Crucifixion  as  if  seen  by  lightning-flashes,  against 
a  sky  crackling  with  flames,  w^hile  a  poisonous 
green  light  flashes  upon  the  tormented  figures 
below.  The  hollow  anatomy  of  Christ  turns  livid, 
the  Httle  angels  who  flutter  about  the  cross  are 
shadowed  by  the  same  spectral  light,  which  sickens 

6i 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

their  wings  to  green ;  another  angel,  at  the  foot  of 
the  cross,  is  coloured  like  the  gold  heart  and  green 
leaves  of  a  crocus.  This  angel  catches  the  blood 
dripping  from  the  feet  of  Christ  in  a  handkerchief, 
the  Magdalen  kneels  beside  him,  holding  up  another 
handkerchief  to  catch  the  blood  ;  the  other  angels 
catch  in  their  hands  the  blood  dripping  from  the 
hands  and  side  of  Christ.  In  this  picture  all  the 
extravagances  of  Spanish  painting  are  outdone  ;  but 
without  a  trace  of  affectation.  All  these  emblemati- 
cal details  are  like  things  seen,  in  a  fury  of  vision, 
by  one  to  whom  sight  is  a  disease  of  the  imagination. 
In  an  Assumption  of  the  Virgin  in  S.  Vicente  at 
Toledo,  the  whole  landscape  seems  on  fire,  with 
flames  of  more  than  sunset,  as  an  angel  in  a  pale 
saffron  robe  bears  up  the  feet  of  the  Virgin,  one 
gorgeous  wing  of  ruddy  brown  spread  out  across 
the  sky,  while  flame-winged  angels  surround  her, 
one  playing  languidly  upon  a  'cello.  And  this 
surging  tumult  of  colour,  wild,  sensitive,  eloquent, 
seems  to  speak  a  new  language,  with  vehement 
imperfection.  Here,  as  in  the  Baptism  in  the 
Hospital  a  fuera,  in  which  earnestness  has  become 
a  kind  of  dementia,  there  is  some  of  the  beauty  of 
an  extravagant  natural  thing,  of  a  stormy  and  in- 
coherent sunset.  It  is  as  if  a  painter  had  tried  to 
embody  such  a  sunset,  creating  fantastic  figures  to 
translate  the  suggestion  of  its  outlines. 

And  so  Theotocopuli  ends,  in  that  exaggeration 
of  himself  which  has  overtaken  so  many  of  those 
artists  who  have  cared  more  for  energy  than  for 
62 


A  Study  at  Toledo. 

beauty.  His  palette  is  still  the  limited,  cold  palette 
which  we  have  seen  in  the  hands  of  his  portrait  at 
Seville,  but  colour  seems  to  chafe  against  restraint, 
and  so  leap  more  wildly  within  its  limits.  The 
influence  of  Tintoretto  is  after  all  unforgotten, 
though  it  is  seen  now  in  a  kind  of  parody  of  itself. 
Lines  lengthen  and  harden,  as  men  seem  to  grow 
into  trees,  ridged  and  gnarled  with  strange  accidents 
of  growth.  That  spiritual  body  which  he  has 
sought  for  the  reticent  souls  of  his  portraits  becomes 
a  stained,  earthly  thing  which  has  known  corruption. 
No  longer,  at  all  equably,  master  of  himself  or  of 
his  vision,  he  allows  his  skill  of  hand  to  become 
narrow,  fanatical ;  and,  in  his  last  pictures,  seems 
rather  an  angry  prophet,  denouncing  humanity, 
than  a  painter,  faithful  to  the  beauty  and  expressive- 
ness of  natural  things. 

Spring,  1899. 


63 


The  Poetry  of  Santa  Teresa 
and  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz., 

I. 

"Here  in  Spain  there  are  many  poets,"  said  a 
Capuchin  monk  to  me,  as,  on  Christmas  Day,  we 
stood  together  in  the  convent  hbrary,  looking 
through  the  barred  windows  at  the  sunset  which 
flamed  over  Seville.  "The  people  are  the  poets. 
They  love  beautiful  things,  they  are  moved  by 
them ;  that  word  which  you  will  hear  constantly  on 
their  lips:  Mir  a!  ('Look!')  is  itself  significant. 
They  would  say  it  now  if  they  were  here,  looking 
at  the  sunset,  and  they  would  point  out  to  one  another 
the  colours,  the  shape  of  that  tower  silhouetted 
against  the  sky ;  they  would  be  full  of  excited 
dehght.  Is  there  not  something  in  that  of  the 
poetic  attitude?  They  have  the  feeling;  some- 
times they  put  it  into  words,  and  make  those  rhymes 
of  which  the  greater  part  are  lost,  but  some  are  at 
last  written  down,  and  you  can  read  them  in  books." 
We  had  been  discussing  the  Spanish  mystics, 
San  Juan  de  la  Cruz,  Juan  de  Avila,  Fray  Luis 
de  Leon,  Santa  Teresa;  and  I  had  just  been  turning 
over  a  facsimile  of  the  original  MS.  of  the  Castillo 
Interior  in  Santa  Teresa's  bold,  not  very  legible, 
handwriting,  with  its  feminine  blots  here  and  there 
on  the  pages.  I  had  been  praising  the  great  poetry 
of  the  two  saints,  and  lamenting  the  rarity  of  really 
sincere,  really  personal,  lyric  poetry  in  Spanish ; 
and  the  monk's  answer,  as  I  thought  over  it  on 
64 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

my  way  home  that  evening,  seemed  to  me  to  point 
to  the  real  truth  of  the  matter.  The  Spanish 
temperament,  as  I  have  been  able  to  see  for  myself 
during  the  three  months  I  have  already  been  in 
Spain,  is  essentially  a  poetical  temperament.  It  is 
brooding,  passionate,  sensitive,  at  once  voluptuous 
and  solemn.  Here  is  at  least  the  material  for 
poetry.  But  the  moment  a  Spaniard  begins  to 
write,  he  has  the  choice  of  an  extraordinary  number 
of  bad  models,  and,  as  in  his  architecture,  as  in  so 
much  of  even  his  painting,  he  has  been  readier  to 
adapt  than  to  invent.  Even  Calderon,  a  great 
poet,  is  a  perilous  model;  and  what  of  Gongora 
or  Garbilaso,  of  Espronceda  or  Zorrilla  .?  On  the 
one  hand  one  finds  extravagance  and  affectation ; 
on  the  other,  haste,  homeliness,  and  lack  of  care. 
In  a  sense,  this  poetry  is  often  enough  personal, 
but  when  it  is  personal  in  sentiment  it  is  not  personal 
in  form,  as  in  Espronceda,  who  indeed  wrote  the 
poetry  he  was  living,  but  wrote  it  in  the  manner 
of  Byron.  The  natural  human  voice,  speaking 
straight  out  of  the  heart,  pure  lyric  poetry,  that  is, 
cannot  be  found  in  Spanish  literature  outside  the 
mystics,  and  a  final  choice  may  indeed  be  limited 
to  Santa  Teresa  and  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz.  These 
speak  to  God  in  Christ,  the  one  as  a  mother  to  a 
child,  the  other  as  a  wife  to  a  husband.  For  each, 
the  individual  passion  makes  its  own  form,  almost 
its  own  language,  so  that  Crashaw's  brilliant  line 
of  verse,  "O  'tis  not  Spanish  but  'tis  Heaven  she 
speaks  1 "  is  really  a  subtle  criticism  as  well.     And, 

65 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

singularly  unlike  as  is  the  childishly  naked  simplicity 
of  Santa  Teresa  to  the  elaborate  web  of  sweetness 
in  which  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz  enfolds  his  rapture, 
each  has  the  same  supreme  lyric  quality :  personal 
passion  moulding  individual  form. 

And  the  poetry  of  the  people,  in  its  lesser,  its 
less  final  way,  has  this  quality  too ;  so  that  in  these 
two  great  Spanish  poets  we  see  the  flower  at  last 
growing  directly  from  the  root.  An  unknown, 
perfectly  spontaneous  poet  of  the  people  makes  up 
his  little  stanza  of  three  or  four  lines  because  he  has 
something  to  say  which  hurts  him  so  much  to  keep 
in  that  he  is  obliged  to  say  it.  This  of  itself  is  not 
enough  to  make  poetry,  but  it  will  make  poetry  if 
so  intense  a  desire  comes  to  life  in  a  nature  already 
poetically  sensitive,  in  a  nature  such  as  this  of  the 
Spaniards.  And  the  Spaniard,  with  that  something 
abrupt,  nervous,  which  there  is  in  him,  is  singularly 
well  able  to  condense  emotion  into  brief  form, 
such  as  he  has  created  for  these  popular  songs, 
which  are  briefer  than  those  of  most  other  nations, 
an  impassioned  statement,  and  no  more. 

In  the  poetry  of  Santa  Teresa  we  find  almost 
the  form  of  the  popular  song,  and  a  choice  of  words 
which  is  for  the  most  part  no  more  than  an  in- 
stinctively fine  selection  of  its  actual  language.  San 
Juan  de  la  Cruz,  who  lived  habitually  in  an  abstract 
world,  out  of  which  only  a  supreme  emotion  could 
draw  him,  has  a  more  conscious  choice  of  language, 
subtilising  upon  words  that  he  may  render  all  the 
subtlety  of  spiritual  sensation ;  and  he  uses  largely 
66 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

a  favourite  literary  form  of  that  time,  the  five-Hne 
stanza  in  which,  for  example,  the  greater  part  of 
the  poems  of  Fray  Luis  de  Leon  are  written.  But 
I  am  sure  neither  the  one  nor  the  other  ever  wrote 
a  line  with  the  intention  of  "making  poetry,"  that 
intention  which  ruins  Spanish  verse  to  a  deeper 
degree  than  the  verse  of  most  nations.  They  had 
something  to  say  which  could  not  be  said  in  prose, 
a  "lyrical  cry"  was  in  them  which  they  could  not 
repress ;  and  heaven  worked  together  with  earth 
that  Spanish  lyrical  poetry  might  be  born  and  die 
within  the  lifetime  of  two  friends. 


IL 

The  poetry  of  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz  is  meta- 
physical fire,  a  sort  of  white  heat  in  which  the 
abstract,  the  almost  negative,  becomes  ecstatically 
reahsed  by  the  senses.  Here,  in  a  translation  as 
literal  as  I  can  make  it,  line  for  line,  and  with  exactly 
the  same  arrangement  and  repetition  of  rhymes, 
is  his  most  famous  poem,  En  una  Noche  escura,  a 
poem  which  is  the  keystone  of  his  whole  philosophy  : 

Upon  an  obscure  night, 

Fevered  with  love  in  love's  anxiety, 
(Oh,  hapless-happy  plight!) 

I  went,  none  seeing  me, 
Forth  from  my  house  where  all  things  quiet  be. 

By  night,  secure  from  sight. 

And  by  the  secret  stair,  disguisedly, 
(Oh,  hapless-happy  plight !) 

(>7 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

By  night,  and  privily, 
Forth  from  my  house  where  all  things  quiet  be. 

Blest  night  of  wandering. 

In  secret,  when  by  none  might  I  be  spied, 
Nor  I  see  anything; 

Without  a  light  or  guide, 
Save  that  which  in  my  heart  burnt  in  my  side. 

That  light  did  lead  me  on. 

More  surely  than  the  shining  of  noontide. 
Where  well  I  knew  that  one 

Did  for  my  coming  bide ; 
Where  he  abode  might  none  but  he  abide. 

O  night  that  didst  lead  thus, 

O  night  more  lovely  than  the  dawn  of  light, 
O  night  that  broughtest  us. 

Lover  to  lover's  sight. 
Lover  with  loved  in  marriage  of  delight ! 

Upon  my  flowery  breast, 

Wholly  for  him,  and  save  himself  for  none, 
There  did  I  give  sweet  rest 

To  my  beloved  one  ; 
The  fanning  of  the  cedars  breathed  thereon. 

When  the  first  moving  air 

Blew  from  the  tower,  and  waved  his  locks  aside, 
His  hand,  with  gentle  care, 

Did  wound  me  in  the  side, 
And  in  my  body  all  my  senses  died. 

All  things  I  then  forgot, 

My  cheek  on  him  who  for  my  coming  came ; 
All  ceased,  and  I  was  not, 

Leaving  my  cares  and  shame 
Among  the  lilies,  and  forgetting  them. 

The  greater  part  of  the  prose  of  San  Juan  de  la 
68 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

Cruz  is  built  up  out  of  this  poem,  or  condensed 
into  it :  the  Noche  Escura  del  Alma  is  a  Hne-by-hne 
commentary  upon  it,  and  the  Subida  del  Monte 
Carmelo,  a  still  longer  work,  takes  this  poem  for 
starting-point,  and  declares  that  the  whole  of  its 
doctrine  is  to  be  found  in  these  stanzas.  The  third 
and  last  of  the  three  contemplative  books,  the 
Llama  de  Amor  Viva,  is,  in  a  similar  way,  a  com- 
mentary on  the  poem  which  follows  : 

O  flame  of  living  love, 
That  dost  eternally 
Pierce  through  my  soul  with  so  consuming  heat. 
Since  there's  no  help  above. 
Make  thou  an  end  of  me, 
And  break  the  bond  of  this  encounter  sweet. 

O  burn  that  burns  to  heal ! 
O  more  than  pleasant  wound  ! 
And  O  soft  hand,  O  touch  most  delicate. 
That  dost  new  life  reveal, 
That  dost  in  grace  abound, 
And,  slaying,  dost  from  death  to  life  translate. 

O  lamps  of  fire  that  shined 
With  so  intense  a  light. 
That  those  deep  caverns  where  the  senses  live. 
Which  were  obscure  and  blind, 
Now  with  strange  glories  bright, 
Both  heat  and  light  to  his  beloved  give. 

With  how  benign  intent 

Rememberest  thou  my  breast. 
Where  thou  alone  abidest  secretly. 
And  in  thy  sweet  ascent. 

With  glory  and  good  possessed, 
How  delicately  thou  teachest  love  to  me  ! 

69 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Thus  the  whole  Obras  EspiritualeSy  614  quarto 
pages  in  my  copy  of  the  original  edition  of  1618, 
are  but  a  development  of  these  two  poems ;  the 
poetry,  as  it  should  be,  being  at  the  root  of  the 
philosophy. 

In  that  strange,  pedantic  "figure"  which  stands 
at  the  beginning  of  the  Subida  del  Monte  Carmelo, 
the  narrow  way  which  leads  to  the  mount  is 
inscribed,  "Nothing,  nothing,  nothing,  nothing, 
nothing,"  and  above,  "and  in  the  mount  nothing"; 
but  above  that  begin  higher  heights,  inscribed 
with  the  names  of  the  ultimate  virtues,  and  above 
that  the  "divine  silence"  and  the  "divine  wisdom," 
and  the  dwelling  of  the  soul  with  God  himself. 
With  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz  the  obscure  night  is  a 
way,  the  negation  of  all  earthly  things,  of  the  earthly 
senses  even,  a  means  to  the  final  union  with  God  ; 
and  it  is  in  this  union  that  darkness  blossoms  into 
the  glittering  delights  of  the  poems.  Pierce  the 
dark  night  to  its  centre,  and  you  will  find  light, 
for  you  will  find  God.  "And  so,"  he  tells  us, 
"in  this  soul,  in  which  now  no  appetite  abides,  nor 
other  imaginings,  nor  forms  of  other  created  things ; 
most  secretly  it  abides  in  so  much  the  more  inner 
interior,  and  more  straitly  embraced,  as  it  is  itself 
the  more  pure,  and  single  of  all  things  but  God." 
This  rapture  of  negation  becomes  poetry,  and 
poetry  of  the  highest  order,  because  it  is  part  of  a 
nature  to  which,  if  God  is  what  Vaughan  calls  a 
"deep  but  dazzling  darkness,"  he  is  also  the 
supreme  love,  to  be  apprehended  humanly  by  this 
70 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

quality,  for  which,  and  in  which,  he  put  on  humanity. 
To  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz  the  idea  of  God  is  an  idea 
which  can  be  apprehended  mentally  only  by  a  series 
of  negations;  the  person  of  God  can  be  appre- 
hended only  emotionally,  and  best  under  the  figure, 
which  he  accepts  from  the  "Song  of  Solomon," 
of  earthly  marriage,  the  marriage  of  the  soul  and 
Christ.  At  once  the  door  is  opened  in  the  seventh 
heaven  of  metaphysics  for  all  the  flowers  in  which 
the  earth  decks  itself  for  lovers;  and  this  monk 
can  give  lessons  to  lovers.  His  great  poem  of  forty 
stanzas,  the  Cancion  entre  el  Alma  y  el  Esposo,  once 
or  twice  becoming  almost  ludicrous  in  the  hvehness 
of  its  natural  images,  as  when  the  Spouse  drinks 
in  the  "interior  bodega"  of  the  Beloved,  has  a 
pecuHar  fragrance,  as  of  very  strong  natural  per- 
fumes, perfumes  really  made  honestly  out  of  flowers, 
though  in  the  fieriest  of  alcohols.  Here,  and  in 
the  two  mystical  love-poems  which  I  have  translated, 
there  is  an  abandonment  to  all  the  sensations  of 
love,  which  seems  to  me  to  exceed,  and  on  their 
own  ground,  in  directness  and  intensity  of  spiritual 
and  passionate  longing,  most  of  what  has  been 
written  by  the  love-poets  of  all  ages.  These  lines, 
so  full  of  rich  and  strange  beauty,  ache  with  desire 
and  with  all  the  subtlety  of  desire.  They  analyse 
the  sensations  of  the  soul,  as  lovers  do,  that  they 
may  draw  out  their  sweetness  more  luxuriously. 
In  a  merely  human  love  they  would  be  almost 
perverse,  so  learned  are  they  in  sensation.  Sanctified 
to  divine  uses,  they  do  but  swing  a  more  odorous 

71 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

incense,  in  censers  of  more  elaborately  beaten 
gold,  in  the  service  of  a  perpetual  Mass  to  the 
Almighty. 

Of  the  Canciones  there  are  but  five  ;  and  of  these 
I  have  translated  another,  somewhat  more  abstract, 
less  coloured,  than  the  rest. 

Well  do  I  know  the  spring  that  doth  abound, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

That  everlasting  spring,  though  hidden  close, 
Well  do  I  know  whither  and  whence  it  flows. 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

Beginning  know  I  not,  for  none  there  is, 
But  know  that  all  beginning  comes  from  this, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

I  know  there  is  not  any  fairer  thing, 
And  that  the  heavens  and  earth  drink  of  this  spring, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

I  know  that  end  within  it  is  not  found. 
Nor  is  there  plummet  that  its  depths  can  sound, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

Upon  its  brightness  doth  no  shadow  come : 
Well  know  I  that  all  light  cometh  therefrom. 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

I  know  its  currents  are  so  hard  to  bind, 
They  water  hell  and  heaven  and  human-kind, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

The  current  that  from  this  deep  spring  doth  flow, 
How  mighty  is  its  flowing,  well  I  know, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 
72 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

This  everlasting  spring  is  occulted, 
To  give  us  life,  within  this  living  bread, 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

Here  it  doth  speak  to  man,  and  say  to  him : 
Drink  of  this  living  water,  although  dim. 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

This  living  spring,  I  have  desired  of  old, 
Within  this  bread  of  life  do  I  behold. 
Although  it  is  the  night. 

But,  besides  the  Canciones,  there  are  five  Coplas 
and  Glosas,  still  more  abstract  than  this  poem,  but 
brimful  of  what  I  have  called  metaphysical  fire, 
"toda  ciencia  transcendiendo"  ;  the  ecstasy  striving 
to  find  immediate,  and  no  longer  mediate,  v^ords 
for  its  revelation.  Finally,  there  are  ten  Romances^ 
of  which  all  but  the  last  are  written  in  quatrains 
linked  by  a  single  rhyme,  the  accommodating 
Spanish  rhyme  in  "ia."  They  are  Biblical  para- 
phrases and  statements  of  theological  doctrine,  and 
reverence  has  not  permitted  them  to  find  any  fine, 
wild  liberties  for  themselves,  like  the  other,  more 
instinctive,  more  emotionally  inspired  poems.  They 
have  the  archaic  formahty  of  the  fourteenth-century 
paintings  of  the  Madonna,  stiffly  embroidered  with 
gold,  and  waited  on  by  formal  angels.  Some 
personal  sentiment  yet  remains,  but  the  personal 
form  is  gone,  and  they  might  seem  to  have  been 
really  written  in  an  earlier  century. 


73 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

III. 

With  Santa  Teresa  all  is  changed.  Her  poems 
are  improvisations,  seem  to  have  been  written  by 
accident,  and  certainly  with  no  double  or  treble 
or  hundredfold  meanings  concealed  within  them, 
like  those  of  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz.^  They  are  im- 
petuous, incorrect,  full  of  joyous  life,  almost  of 
hilarity.  Many  of  them  are  little  songs  with 
refrains ;  some  are  composed  on  motives  given 
by  others,  many  for  special  occasions,  such  as  a 
taking  of  the  veil.  One  is  a  sort  of  paraphrase, 
or  variant,  of  a  poem  of  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz.  It 
is  interesting  to  compare  the  two,  and  to  see  how 
in  the  very  first  verse  Santa  Teresa  brings  in  an 
idea  entirely,  and  how  characteristically !  her  own : 
"This  divine  union  of  love  with  him  I  love  makes 
God  my  captive,  and  sets  free  my  heart ;  but 
causes  such  grief  in  me  to  see  God  my  prisoner, 
that  I  die  because  I  die  not."  She  gives  herself 
to  God,  as  it  were,  with  a  great  leap  into  his  arms. 
She  has  no  savorous  reflections,  no  lingering  over 
delights ;  a  practical  swiftness,  a  woman's  heart, 
and  that  joy  which  burns  through  all  her  work. 
"That  love  alone  is  that  which  gives  value  to  all 
things,"  none  knew  so  well  as  she,  or  realised  so 
simply.  "O  pitying  and  loving  Lord  of  my 
life!     Thou    hast    said:     'Come    unto    me    all    ye 

'  He  can  be  as  minute  in  his  explanations  as  to  comment  on  the  first 
three  lines  of  the  second  stanza  of  0  llama  de  amor  viva:  The  Bum  is 
the  Holy  Spirit,  the  Hand  is  the  Father,  and  the  Touch  is  the  Son. 

74 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

that  thirst,  and  I  will  give  you  to  drink.'  How, 
then,  can  these  but  suffer  great  thirst  that  are  now 
burning  in  living  flames  in  the  desire  of  these 
miserable  things  of  the  earth  ?  Needs  must  there 
be  much  water  indeed  if  it  is  not  to  fail  and  be 
consumed.  Now  know  I,  Lord,  of  thy  bounty 
that  thou  shalt  give  it :  thyself  sayest  it,  and  thou 
canst  not  fail  from  thy  words.  Yet  if  they,  used 
to  living  in  this  fire,  and  brought  up  in  it,  feel  it 
not,  nor  have  reason  in  their  unreasonableness  to 
see  how  great  is  their  necessity,  what  remedy,  O 
my  God  ^  Thou  hast  come  into  the  world  to  remedy 
even  such  great  necessities ;  begin.  Lord  :  in  these 
most  difl&cult  things  dost  thou  most  show  thy 
pit3^  Behold,  my  God,  that  thine  enemies  make 
much  headway  :  have  pity  on  those  that  have  no 
pity  on  themselves,  now  that  their  mischance  so 
holds  them  that  they  desire  not  to  come  to  thee : 
come  thou  to  them,  my  God.  I  demand  it  in 
their  name,  and  know  that  when  they  shall  hear, 
and  return  to  themselves,  and  begin  to  delight  in 
thee,  these  now  dead  shall  come  to  life.  O  life, 
that  thou  givest  to  all !  Deny  me  not  this  most 
sweet  water  that  thou  hast  promised  to  those  that 
seek  it :  I  do  seek  it.  Lord,  and  demand  it,  and 
come  for  it  to  thee  :  hide  not  thyself.  Lord,  from 
me,  for  thou  knowest  my  need,  and  that  it  is  the 
true  medicine  of  the  soul  wounded  by  thee.  O 
Lord,  what  manner  of  fires  are  there  in  this  life! 
Oh,  how  rightly  do  we  live  in  fear !  Some  there 
are  that   consume  the  soul,   others  that  purify  it, 

75 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

that  it  may  live  for  ever,  joying  in  thee.  O  Hving 
streams  of  the  wounds  of  my  God  !  How  do  ye 
flow  ever  with  great  abundance  for  our  maintenance, 
and  how  securely  shall  they  go  through  the  perils 
of  this  miserable  life  that  are  sustained  by  this 
divine  beverage."  "O  true  lover!"  she  cries, 
in  her  prose  Exclamaciones,  "with  what  pity,  with 
what  softness,  with  what  delight,  with  what  tender- 
ness, and  with  what  great  manifestations  of  love 
thou  curest  the  wounds  that  with  the  arrows  of  that 
same  love  thou  hast  made!"  And  her  verse,  as 
in  this  poem,  is  an  outpouring  of  love  which  speaks 
the  simplest  lovers'  language,  like  a  woman  who 
cannot  say  "I  love  you!"  too  often. 

If,  Lord,  thy  love  for  me  is  strong 

As  this  which  binds  me  unto  thee, 
What  holds  me  from  thee,  Lord,  so  long, 

What  holds  thee,  Lord,  so  long  from  me  ? 

O  soul,  what  then  desirest  thou  ? 

—  Lord,  I  would  see  thee,  who  thus  choose  thee. 
What  fears  can  yet  assail  thee  now  ? 

—  All  that  I  fear  is  but  to  lose  thee. 

Love's  whole  possession  I  entreat, 

Lord,  make  my  soul  thine  own  abode, 

And  I  will  build  a  nest  so  sweet 
It  may  not  be  too  poor  for  God. 

A  soul  in  God  hidden  from  sin. 

What  more  desires  for  thee  remain, 

Save  but  to  love,  and  love  ap;ain. 
And,  all  on  flame  with  love  within, 

Love  on,  and  turn  to  love  again  ? 
76 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

Another  division  of  her  poems  consists  of  songs 
for  Christmas,  for  the  Circumcision,  for  the  Virgin 
as  mother;  and  here,  adapting  to  her  use  a  form 
already  existing,  she  practically  invents  a  new  form, 
in  these  httle  lyric  dramas,  dialogues  of  the  shep- 
herds, in  which  the  same  shepherds  appear,  with 
their  strange  names,  Bras  or  Brasillo,  Menga,  with 
Llorente  and  the  invariable  Gil.  I  have  translated 
three  of  them,  with  all  the  archaisms,  accidents  of 
form,  omission  or  reversal  of  rhymes,  of  the  original, 
and,  in  the  refrain  of  the  second,  an  assonance 
exactly  reproducing  the  original  assonance. 


Let  mine  eyes  see  thee, 

Sweet  Jesus  of  Nazareth ; 
Let  mine  eyes  see  thee, 

And  then  see  death. 

Let  them  see  that  care 

Roses  and  jessamine ; 
Seeing  thy  face  most  fair, 

All  blossoms  are  therein. 
Flower  of  seraphin, 

Sweet  Jesus  of  Nazareth, 
Let  mine  eyes  see  thee. 

And  then  see  death. 

Nothing  I  require 

Where  my  Jesus  is ; 
Anguish  all  desire, 

Saving  only  this ; 
All  my  help  is  his, 

He  only  succoureth. 

77 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Let  mine  eyes  see  thee, 
Sweet  Jesus  of  Nazareth, 

Let  mine  eyes  see  thee, 
And  then  see  death. 


II. 

Shepherd,  shepherd,  hark  that  calHng ! 
Angels  they  are,  and  the  day  is  dawning. 

What  is  this  ding-dong, 

Or  loud  singing  is  it? 
Come,  Bras,  now  the  day  is  here, 

The  shepherdess  we'll  visit. 
Shepherd,  shepherd,  hark  that  calling! 
Angels  they  are,  and  the  day  is  dawning. 

Oh,  is  this  the  Alcade's  daughter. 
Or  some  lady  come  from  far  ? 

She  is  the  daughter  of  God  the  Father, 
And  she  shines  like  a  star. 

Shepherd,  shepherd,  hark  that  calling ! 

Angels  they  are,  and  the  day  is  dawning. 

III. 

To-day  a  shepherd  and  our  kin, 
O  Gil,  to  ransom  us  is  sent, 
And  he  is  God  Omnipotent. 

For  us  hath  he  cast  down  the  pride 
And  prison  walls  of  Satanas; 
But  he  is  of  the  kin  of  Bras, 
Of  Menga,  also  of  Llorent. 
O  is  not  God  Omnipotent  ? 


78 


If  he  is  God,  how  then  is  he 
Come  hither,  and  here  crucified  ? 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

—  With  his  dying  sin  also  died, 
Enduring  death  the  innocent. 
Gil,  how  is  God  Omnipotent ! 

Why,  I  have  seen  him  born,  pardie. 
And  of  a  most  sweet  shepherdess. 

—  If  he  is  God,  how  can  he  be 

With  such  poor  folk  as  these  content .? 

—  See'st  not  he  is  Omnipotent  ? 

Give  over  idle  parleying, 

And  let  us  serve  him,  you  and  I, 
And  since  he  came  on  earth  to  die, 
Let  us  die  with  him  too,  Llorent ; 
For  he  is  God  Omnipotent. 

These  and  other  ecstasies  over  Christ  in  the 
cradle  are  the  motherly  instinct  in  her  finding  vicari- 
ous satisfaction ;  and  though  we  have  here  an 
instinct  for  which  genius  finds  expression  in  art, 
the  whole  force  of  the  sentiment  can  be  understood 
only  by  one  who  has  seen  a  monk  or  nun  exhibiting 
the  conventual  image  of  the  infant  Jesus  to  a  sym- 
pathetic visitor.  I  have  never  seen  a  livmg  child 
handled  with  more  adoring  tenderness  than  the 
monk  of  whom  I  have  spoken  handled  the  amazingly 
realistic  "Bambino,"  who  lay  in  a  basket  stuffed 
with  straw,  in  his  Httle  frilled  shirt  and  baby's  cap 
with  blue  strings.  Religion,  any  other  controlling 
force,  can  constrain,  can  turn  into  other  directions, 
but  cannot  kill  an  instinct ;  and  the  adoration  of 
the  divine  child  is  the  refuge  of  the  childless,  in 
convents  and  in  the  world. 

But  Santa  Teresa  was  not  only  a  loving  woman 

79 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  a  loving  mother,  she  was  that  great  brain 
and  great  worker  whom  we  know;  and  she  wrote 
marching  songs  for  the  soldiers  of  Christ  in  their 
war  against  the  world,  and  songs  of  triumph  for 
their  victories,  and  songs  of  warning  for  those  who 
were  lightly  undertaking  so  great  an  enterprise. 
In  all  there  is  the  same  impetuous  spirit,  the  same 
close  hold  on  reality,  and  one  to  whom  religion 
was  not  contemplation  but  action,  or  action  even 
in  contemplation.  In  reading  the  poems  of  San 
Juan  de  la  Cruz,  it  is  not  easy  to  remember  that  he 
too  was  a  monastic  reformer :  ^  it  would  be  im- 
possible to  read  the  poems  of  Santa  Teresa  without 
seeing  the  reformer,  the  woman  of  action,  in  the 
poet : 

Caminemos  para  el  cielo, 

Monjas  de  Carmelo! 

She  sings,  leading  them,  on  that  difficult  way; 
and  in  that  "Offering  of  Herself  to  God  that  she 
made,"  in  the  magnificent  poem  with  the  refrain 
"What  would'st  thou  do  with  me.f""  we  see  the 
whole  woman,  "a  woman  for  angelical  height  of 
speculation,  for  masculine  courage  of  performance 
more  than  a  woman,"  in  Crashaw's  famous  words. 
Here,  in  prose,  are  three  stanzas  out  of  the  twelve  : 

What  wouldst  thou,  then,  good  Lord,  that  so  base  a 
servant  should  do  ?     What  service  hast  thou  given  to  this 

^  He  is  described  on  the  title-page  of  his  works    as  "primer  Descaho 
de  la  Reforma  de  N.  Senora  del  Carmen,  Coadjutor  de  la  Bienaventurada 
Virgen  S.  Teresa  de  Jesus,  Fundadora  de  la  misma  Reforma." 
80 


S.  Teresa  and  S.  Juan  de  la  Cruz. 

sinful  slave?  Behold  me  here,  sweet  Love;  sweet  Love, 
behold  me  here  ;  what  wouldst  thou  do  with  me  ? 

See  here  my  heart,  I  lay  it  in  thy  hand,  my  body, 
my  life  and  soul,  my  bowels  and  my  love;  sweet  Spouse 
and  redemption,  since  I  offer  myself  to  be  thine,  what 
wouldst  thou  do  with  me  ? 

Give  me  death,  give  me  life,  give  me  health  or  sickness, 
honour  or  dishonour  give  me,  give  me  war  or  perfect 
peace,  weakness  or  strength  to  my  life :  to  all  I  will 
answer  yes ;  what  wouldst  thou  do  with  me  ? 

This  ardent,  joyous  simplicity,  this  impassioned 
devotion  to  w^hich  every  height  or  depth  of  sacrifice 
was  an  easy  thing,  this  clear  sight  of  God,  not 
through  the  intellectual  negations  nor  the  symboHcal 
raptures  of  San  Juan  de  la  Cruz,  but  face  to  face, 
w^hich  give  Santa  Teresa  her  unique  rank  among 
the  mystics,  as  the  onew^ho  has  seen  spiritual  things 
most  directly,  find  here  their  simplest  expression. 
Here,  as  in  those  poems  of  the  people  with  which 
I  began  by  comparing  these  poems,  a  "flaming 
heart"  burns  outward  to  escape  the  intolerable 
pain  of  its  reclusion. 

Winter,  1899. 


81 


Campoamor. 


Ramon  de  Campoamor  y  Campoosorio,  who  died 
at  Madrid  on  the  I2th  of  February  1901,  was 
born  at  Navia,  in  the  province  of  Asturias,  on  the 
24th  of  September  18 17.  His  career  covers  almost 
the  whole  century :  he  was  the  contemporary  of 
Quintana,  Espronceda,  Zorrilla,  yet  absolutely  un- 
touched by  the  influences  which  made  of  Quintana 
a  lesser  Cowper,  of  Espronceda  a  lesser  Byron,  and 
of  Zorrilla  a  lesser  Longfellow.  Coming  into  a 
literature  in  which  poetry  is  generally  taken  to  be 
but  another  name  for  rhetoric,  he  followed,  long 
before  Verlaine,  Verlaine's  advice  to  "take  rhetoric 
and  wring  its  neck."  The  poetry  of  words,  of 
sounds,  of  abstractions,  that  poetry  which  is  looked 
upon  in  Spain  as  the  most  really  poetical  kind  of 
poetry,  left  him  untouched ;  he  could  but  apply 
to  it  the  Arab  proverb:  "I  hear  the  tic-tac  of  the 
mill,  but  I  see  no  flour."  In  his  Poetica  he  declares 
boldly:  "If  we  except  the  Romancero  and  the 
cantaresy  Spain  has  almost  no  really  national  lyric 
poetry."  "There  are  very  well-built  verses,  that 
are  lads  of  sound  body,  but  without  a  soul.  Such 
are  those  of  Herrera  and  of  almost  all  his  imitators, 
the  grandiloquent  poets."  In  the  simple  masculine 
verse  of  Jorge  Manrique  (whose  great  poem,  the 
Coplas  por  la  muerte  de  su  Padre,  is  known  to  most 
English  readers  in  its  admirable  translation  by 
Longfellow)  he  saw  an  incomparable  model,  whose 
grave  and  passionate  simplicity  might  well  have  been 
the  basis  of  a  national  style.  "Poetry,"  he  declares, 
82 


Campoamor. 

in  what  seemed  to  his  critics  an  amusing  paradox, 
*'is  the  rhythmical  representation  of  a  thought 
through  the  medium  of  an  image,  expressed  in  a 
language  which  cannot  be  put  in  prose  more  natu- 
rally or  with  fewer  words.  .  .  .  There  is  in  poetry 
no  immortal  expression  that  can  be  said  in  prose 
with  more  simplicity  or  with  more  precision." 
Prose,  indeed,  seemed  to  him  not  really  an  art  at 
all,  and  when  Valera,  a  genuine  artist  in  prose, 
defended  his  own  ground  by  asserting  that  "meta- 
physics is  the  one  useless  science  and  poetry  the 
one  useless  art,"  Campoamor  replied  in  verse, 
defining  prose  as  "la  jerga  animal  del  ser  humano" 
("the  jabber  of  the  human  animal").  "What 
are  philosophical  systems,"  he  asks,  "but  poems 
without  images .? "  and,  protesting  against  the 
theory  of  "art  for  art,"  and  suggesting  "art  for 
ideas,"  or  "transcendental"  art,  as  a  better  definition 
of  what  was  at  least  his  own  conception,  he  sums 
up  with  his  customary  neatness:  "Metaphysics 
is  the  science  of  ideas,  religion  is  the  science  of  ideas 
converted  into  sentiments,  and  art  the  science  of 
ideas  converted  into  images.  Metaphysics  is  the 
true,  reHgion  the  good,  and  aesthetics  the  beautiful." 
By  calling  art  "transcendental"  he  means,  not 
that  it  should  be  in  itself  either  philosophical  or 
didactic,  much  less  abstract,  for  "art  is  the  enemy 
of  abstractions  .  .  .  and  whatever  becomes  im- 
personal evaporates,"  but  that  it  should  contain 
in  itself,  as  its  foundation,  a  "universal  human 
truth,"   without   which    "it   is   no   more   than   the 

83 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

letters  of  tattling  women."  "All  lyric  poetry 
should  be  a  little  drama."  "In  the  drama  of  the 
Creation  everything  was  written  by  God  in  sympa- 
thetic ink.  We  have  but  to  apply  the  reagent 
and  hold  it  to  the  light.  The  best  artist  is  the  best 
translator  of  the  works  of  God."  "It  has  been 
my  constant  endeavour,"  he  tells  us,  "to  approach 
art  through  ideas,  and  to  express  them  in  ordinary 
language,  thus  revolutionising  the  substance  and 
form  of  poetry,  the  substance  with  the  Doloras  and 
the  form  with  the  Pequenos  Poemas."  Beginning 
at  first  with  fables,  he  abandoned  the  form  of  the 
fable,  because  it  seemed  to  him  that  the  fable  could 
only  take  root  in  countries  in  which  the  doctrine 
of  the  transmigration  of  souls  was  still  believed. 
"The  Dolor  a,  a  drama  taken  direct  from  life,  with- 
out the  metaphors  and  symbols  of  indirect  poetry, 
seemed  to  me  a  form  more  European,  more  natural, 
and  more  human  than  that  of  the  oriental  fable." 
But  the  Dolora  was  to  retain  thus  much  of  the  fable, 
that  by  means  of  its  drama  it  was  to  "solve  some 
universal  problem,"  the  solution  growing  out  of 
the  actual  structure  of  the  story.  Thus,  in  poetry, 
subject  is  all-important,  subject  including  "the 
argument  and  the  action."  "In  every  pebble  of 
the  brook  there  is  part  of  an  Escurial :  the  difficulty 
and  the  merit  are  in  building  it."  "Novelty  of 
subject,  regularity  of  plan,  the  method  with  which 
that  plan  is  carried  out":  these,  together  with 
the  fundamental  idea,  which  is  to  be  of  universal 
application,  "transcendental,"  as  he  calls  it,  are 
84 


Campoamor. 

the  requisites  of  a  work  of  art ;  it  is  on  these  grounds 
that  a  work  of  art  is  to  be  judged.  "Every  work 
of  art  should  be  able  to  reply  affirmatively  to  these 
four  questions  : 

The  subject :   can  it  be  narrated  ? 

The  plan  :   can  it  be  painted  ? 

The  design  :   has  it  a  purpose  ? 

The  style  :   is  it  the  man  ? " 

Campoamor  was  no  classical  scholar,  and  it  is 
but  hesitatingly  that  he  suggests,  on  the  authority 
of  "a  French  critic,  who  had  it  from  Aristotle," 
that  the  theory  of  the  Greeks  in  poetry  was  in  many 
points  similar  to  his.  If  we  turn  to  Matthew 
Arnold's  preface  to  his  Poems,  we  shall  find  all 
that  is  fundamental  in  Campoamor's  argument 
stated  finally,  and  in  the  form  of  an  appeal  to 
classical  models.  "The  radical  difference  between 
their  poetical  theory"  (the  Greeks',  that  is)  "and 
ours  consists,  it  appears  to  me,  in  this  :  that  with 
them  the  poetical  character  of  the  action  in  itself, 
and  the  conduct  of  it,  were  the  first  consideration ; 
with  us  attention  is  fixed  mainly  on  the  value  of  the 
separate  thoughts  and  images  which  occur  in  the 
treatment  of  an  action."  And,  further  on  in  that 
admirable  preface,  Matthew  Arnold  assures  "the 
individual  writer"  that  he  "may  certainly  learn 
of  the  ancients,  better  than  anywhere  else,  three 
things  which  it  is  vitally  important  for  him  to 
know  :  the  all-importance  of  the  choice  of  a  subject, 
the  necessity  of  accurate  construction,  and  the 
subordinate  character  of  expression."     Is  not  this 

85 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

precisely  the  aim  of  Campoamor  ?  and  is  it  not  as 
a  natural  corollary  to  this  severe  theory  of  poetical 
construction  that  he  tells  us :  "Style  is  not  a  ques- 
tion of  figures  of  speech,  but  of  electric  fluid"; 
"rhythm  alone  should  separate  the  language  of 
verse  from  that  of  prose"  ;  yet  that  language  should 
always  have  an  inner  beauty,  "the  mysterious 
magic  of  music,  so  that  it  should  say,  not  what  the 
writer  intends,  but  what  the  reader  desires"? 
And  so  we  come,  not  unnaturally,  to  his  ideal  in 
writing:  "To  write  poems  whose  ideas  and  whose 
words  had  been,  or  seemed  to  have  been,  thought 
or  written  by  every  one." 

Upon  these  theories,  it  might  well  seem  to  us, 
a  writer  is  left  at  all  events  free,  and  with  a  very 
reasonable  kind  of  liberty,  to  make  the  most  of  him- 
self. Only,  after  all,  the  question  remains  :  What 
was  Campoamor's  conception  of  subject  and  develop- 
ment ;  how  far  was  his  precision  a  poetical  precision  ; 
did  he,  in  harmonising  the  language  of  prose  and 
of  verse,  raise  the  one  or  lower  the  other  ? 

The  twelve  volumes  of  Campoamor's  collected 
poems  contain  El  Drama  UniversaU  a  sort  of  epic 
in  eight  "days"  and  forty-seven  scenes,  written 
in  heroic  quatrains,  and  worthy,  a  Spanish  critic 
assures  us,  of  "an  Ariosto  of  the  soul";  Colon,  a 
narrative  poem  in  sixteen  cantos,  written  in  ottava 
rima;  El  Licenciado  Torralba,  a  legendary  poem 
in  eight  cantos,  written  in  iambic  verse  of  varying 
length ;  three  series  of  Pequeiios  Poemas,  each  con- 
taining from  ten  to  twelve  narrative  poems  written 
86 


Campoamor. 

in  a  similar  form  of  verse ;  two  series  of  Doloras, 
short  lyrical  poems,  of  which  I  have  already  quoted 
his  own  definition ;  a  volume  of  Humoradas,  con- 
taining some  hundreds  of  epigrams ;  and  two 
volumes  of  early  work,  brought  together  under 
the  name  of  Poesias  y  Fdhulas.  Besides  these,  he 
wrote  some  plays,  the  admirable  volume  called 
PoHica  Polemicas  Literdrias  and  a  contribution  to 
metaphysics  called  Lo  Absoluto.  Of  his  long  poems, 
only  one  is  what  Rossetti  called  "amusing,"  only 
El  Licenciado  Torralba  has  that  vital  energy  which 
keeps  a  poem  alive.  With  this  exception  we 
need  consider  only  the  three  collections  in  which 
a  single  thing,  a  consistent  "criticism  of  life,"  is 
attempted  under  different,  but  closely  allied  forms : 
the  Humoradas,  which  are  epigrams ;  the  Doloras, 
which  he  defines  as  "dramatised  Humoradas" ;  and 
the  Pequenos  Poemas,  which  he  defines  as  "ampli- 
fied Doloras." 

Applied  by  a  great  poetical  intellect,  Campoa- 
mor's  theories  might  have  resulted  in  the  most 
masterly  of  modern  poems ;  but  his  intellect  was 
ingenious  rather  than  imaginative ;  his  vivid  human 
curiosity  was  concerned  with  life  more  after  the 
manner  of  the  novelist  than  of  the  poet ;  his  dramas 
are  often  anecdotes ;  his  insight  is  not  so  much 
wisdom  as  worldly  wisdom.  He  "saw  life  steadily," 
but  he  saw  it  in  little  patches,  commenting  on  facts 
with  a  smiling  scepticism  which  has  in  it  something 
of  the  positive  spirit  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
Believing,  as  he  tells  us,  that  "what  is  most  natural 

87 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

in  the  world  is  the  supernatural,"  he  was  apt  to 
see  the  spiritual  side  of  things,  as  the  Spanish 
painters  have  mostly  seen  it,  in  a  palpable  detach- 
ment from  the  soil,  garlanded  in  clouds.  Con- 
cerned all  his  life  with  the  moods  and  casuistries 
of  love,  he  writes  of  women,  not  of  woman,  and 
ends,  after  all,  in  a  reservation  of  judgment.  Poetry, 
to  him,  was  a  kind  of  psychology,  and  that  is  why 
every  lyric  shaped  itself  naturally  into  what  he 
called  a  drama.  His  whole  interest  was  in  life 
and  the  problems  of  life,  in  people  and  their  doings, 
and  in  the  reasons  for  what  they  do.  Others,  he 
tells  us,  may  admire  poetry  which  is  descriptive, 
the  delineation  of  external  things,  or  rhetorical,  a 
sonorous  meditation  over  abstract  things ;  all  that 
he  himself  cares  for  are  ''those  reverberations  that 
light  up  the  windings  of  the  human  heart  and  the 
horizons  that  lie  on  the  other  side  of  material  life." 
Only,  some  imaginative  energy  being  lacking,  all  this 
comes,  for  the  most  part,  to  be  a  kind  of  novelette 
in  verse,  in  the  Pequenos  Poemas,  a  versified  allegory 
in  the  Doloras,  or  an  epigram  in  the  Humoradas. 

Can  verse  in  which  there  is  no  ecstasy  be  poetry  } 
There  is  no  ecstasy  in  the  verse  of  Campoamor; 
at  the  most  a  talking  about  ecstasy,  as  in  some  of 
the  Pequenos  Poemas,  in  which  stories  of  passion 
are  told  with  exquisite  neatness,  precision,  sympa- 
thetic warmth;  but  the  passion  never  cries  out, 
never  finds  its  own  voice.  Once  only  in  his  work 
do  I  find  something  like  that  cry,  and  it  is  in  El 
Licenciado  Torralba,  the  story  of  a  kind  of  Faust, 
88 


Campoamor. 

who,  desiring  love  without  unrest,  makes  for  himself 
an  artificial  woman  ("la  mujer  mas  mujer  de  las 
mujeres"),  Muliercula^  to  whom  he  gives 

El  dnimo  del  hello  paganismo, 

^ue,  siendo  menos  que  alma,  es  mas  que  vida. 

Torralba  is  arrested  by  the  Inquisition  as  a  necro- 
mancer and  Muliercula  is  burnt  at  the  stake.  I 
have  translated  the  description  of  her  death  : 

Midmost,  as  if  the  flame  of  the  burning  were 

A  bed  of  love  to  her, 

Muliercula,  with  calm,  unfrightened  face, 

Not  without  beauty  stood, 

And  her  meek  attitude 

Had  something  of  the  tiger's  natural  grace. 

She  suffers,  yet,  no  less. 

Dying  for  him  she  loves,  broods  there, 

Within  the  burning  air. 

Quiet  as  a  bird  within  a  wilderness. 

The  wild  beast's  innocency  all  awake 

Enwraps  her,  and  as  she  burns. 

The  intermittent  flaming  of  the  stake 

To  the  poor  fond  foolish  thing  now  turns 

Into  a  rapture,  dying  for  his  sake ; 

And  then,  because  the  instinct  in  her  sees 

This  only  to  be  had. 

Nothingness  and  its  peace. 

For  her  last,  surest  end,  utterly  glad, 

With  absolute  heart  and  whole. 

That  body  without  a  soul. 

As  if  the  bright  flame  brings 

Roses  to  be  its  bed. 

Dies,  and  so  enters,  dead 

Into  the  august  majesty  of  things  ! 

There,  in  that  fantastic  conception  of  "la  belleza 

89 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

natural  perfecta"  of  woman,  as  the  thinker,  above 
all  others,  has  desired  to  find  her,  I  seem  to  discover 
the  one  passionate  exception  to  Campoamor's 
never  quite  real  men  and  women,  the  novelist's 
lay-figures  of  passion,  about  whom  we  are  told  so 
many  interesting  anecdotes.  A  witty  story-teller, 
a  sympathetic  cynic,  a  transcendental  positivist, 
he  found  the  ways  of  the  world  the  most  amusing 
spectacle  in  nature,  and  for  the  most  part  his  poems 
are  little  reflections  of  life  seen  as  he  saw  it,  with 
sharp,  tolerant,  worldly  eyes.  At  his  best,  certainly 
most  characteristic,  when  he  is  briefest,  as  in  the 
Humoradas,  he  has  returned,  in  these  polished 
fragments,  to  the  lapidary  style  of  Latin  poetry, 
reminding  us  at  times  of  another  Spaniard,  Martial. 
Idea,  clearness,  symmetry,  point,  give  to  this  kind 
of  verse  something  of  the  hardness  and  glitter  of  a 
weapon,  even  when  the  intention  is  not  satirical. 
With  Campoamor  the  blade  is  tossed  into  the  air 
and  caught  again,  harmlessly,  with  all  the  address 
of  an  accomplished  juggler.  He  plays  with  satire 
as  he  plays  with  sentiment,  and,  when  he  is  most 
serious,  will  disguise  the  feeling  with  some  ironical 
afterthought.  Here  are  some  of  the  Humoradas^ 
in  Spanish  and  English.  I  have  translated  them, 
as  will  be  seen,  quite  literally,  and  I  have  tried  to 
choose  them  from  as  many  moods  as  I  could  : 

Al  mover  tu  ahanico  con  gracejo. 
^uitas  el  polvo  al  corazon  mas  viejo. 

You  wave  your  fan  with  such  a  graceful  art. 
You  brush  the  dust  off  from  the  oldest  heart. 
90 


Campoamor. 


Las  ninas  de  las  madres  que  ame  tanto 
Me  besan  ya  como  se  besan  a  un  sanio. 
The  children  of  the  mothers  I  loved,  ah  see, 
They  kiss  me  as  though  they  kissed  a  saint  in  me ! 

Jamas  mujer  alguna 

Ha  salido  del  iodo  de  la  cuna. 
No  woman  yet,  since  they  were  made  all, 
Has  ever  got  quite  outside  of  the  cradle. 

Prohibes  tu  amor  con  tus  desdenes. 

Sin  frutos  prohibidos  no  hay  Edenes. 
Let  your  consent  with  your  disdain  be  hidden : 
No  Paradise  whose  fruit  is  not  forbidden. 

No  le  gusta  el  placer  sin  violencia, 

T  por  eso  ya  cree  la  desgraciada 

^ue  ni  es  pasion,  ni  es  nada, 

El  amor  que  no  turba  la  conciencia. 
She  tastes  not  pleasure  without  strife, 
And  therefore,  hapless  one,  she  feels 
That  love's  not  good  enough  for  life 
Which  hales  not  conscience  by  the  heels. 

Si  es  fdcil  una  hermosa, 

Voy  y  la  dejo; 
Si  es  dificil  la  cosa, 

Tambien  me  alejo, 

Ninas,  cuidad 
De  amar  siempre  con  fdcil 

Difictdtad. 

If  too  easy  she  should  be, 

I,  beholding,  quit  her; 
If  the  thing's  too  hard  for  me. 

Trying  proves  too  bitter. 

Girls,  now  see, 
Best  it  is  to  love  with  easy 

Difficulty. 


91 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Niegas  que  fuiste  mi  mejor  amiga? 
Bien,  bien;  lo  callare :   nobleza  obliga. 

That  you  were  my  best  friend,  do  you  deny  ? 
Well,  well ;   noblesse  oblige  ;   then  so  will  I. 

Te  he  visto  no  se  donde,  ni  se  cuando. 
Ah!  si;  ya  lo  recuerdo,  fue  sonando. 

Have  I  not  seen  you  ?     Yes,  but  where  and  when  ? 
Ah,  I  remember :   I  was  dreaming  then. 

Te  es  infiel!  y  la  quieres?     No  me  extrana; 
To  adoro  a  la  esperanza,  aunque  me  engaiia 

She's  faithless,  and  you  love  her  ?     As  you  will : 
Hope  I  adore,  and  hope  is  faithless  still. 

Vas  cambiando  de  amor  todos  los  anos, 
Mas  no  cambias  jamas  de  desenganos. 

You  change  your  love  each  year ;  yet  Love's  commandment 
Is,  that  you  never  change  your  disenchantment. 

Por  el  la  sinietria  es  la  belleza, 
Aunque  corte  a  las  cosas  la  cabeza. 

Beauty  for  him  was  symmetry,  albeit 

He  sometimes  cut  the  heads  off  things,  to  see  it. 

I  vv^ill  add  three  short  pieces  from  the  Doloras: 

Shamed  though  I  be,  and  weep  for  shame,  'tis  true, 
I  loved  not  good  what  evil  I  love  in  you. 

They  part ;  years  pass ;  they  do  not  see 

Each  other :   after  six  or  seven  : 
"Good  Heaven  !  and  is  it  really  he  ?" 
"And  is  it  really  she  ?  good  Heaven  1" 
92 


Campoamor. 

THE  SOUL  FOR  SALE 

One  day  to  Satan,  Julio,  flushed  with  wine : 
"Wilt  buy  my  soul  ?"     "Of  little  worth  is  It." 

"I  do  but  ask  one  kiss,  and  it  is  thine." 

"Old  sinner,  hast  thou  parted  with  thy  wit  ?" 

"Wilt  buy  it?"  "No."    "But  wherefore?"    "Itismine." 

In  such  work  as  this  there  is  much  of  what  the 
Spaniards  call  "salt":  it  stings  healthily,  it  is 
sane,  temperate,  above  all,  ingenious ;  and  the 
question  as  to  whether  or  not  it  is  poetry  resolves 
itself  into  a  question  as  to  whether  or  not  the  verse 
of  Martial,  indeed  Latin  epigrammatic  verse  in 
general,  is  poetry.  To  the  modern  mind,  brought 
up  on  romantic  models,  only  Catullus  is  quite 
certainly  or  quite  obviously  a  poet  in  his  epigrams ; 
and  his  appeal  to  us  is  as  personal  as  the  appeal  of 
Villon.  He  does  not  generalise,  he  does  not  smile 
while  he  stabs ;  the  passion  of  love  or  hate  burns  in 
him  like  a  flame,  setting  the  verse  on  fire.  Martial 
writes  for  men  of  the  world ;  he  writes  in  order  to 
comment  on  things ;  his  form  has  the  finish  of  a 
thing  made  to  fulfil  a  purpose.  Campoamor  also 
writes  out  of  a  fruitful  experience,  not  transfiguring 
life  where  he  reflects  it.  If  what  he  writes  is  not 
poetry,  in  our  modern  conception  of  the  word,  it 
has  at  least  the  beauty  of  adjustment  to  an  end,  of 
perfect  fitness ;  and  it  reflects  a  temperament,  not 
a  great  poetical  temperament,  but  one  to  which 
human  affairs  were  infinitely  interesting,  and  their 
expression  in  art  the  one  business  of  life. 

1901. 

93 


A  Spanish  Poet  :    Niifiez 

de  Arce.  ^^ 

Poetry  in  Spain,  when  I  wrote  that  article,  was 
represented  by  two  admired  and  popular  poets, 
Ramon  de  Campoamor  and  Caspar  Nunez  de  Arce. 
The  popularity  of  Campoamor  may  be  inferred 
from  the  fact  that  cheap  editions  of  his  works,  and 
cheap  selections  from  them,  are  to  be  found  every- 
where in  Spain ;  but  in  the  case  of  Nunez  de  Arce 
it  is  possible  to  speak  with  greater  precision.  In 
the  preface  to  a  poem  published  in  1866  he  states 
that  no  Spanish  work  has  been  reprinted,  in  this 
century,  so  many  times  in  so  short  a  space  of  time, 
as  the  collection  of  his  poems ;  and  that  between 
1879  and  1885  a  hundred  and  three  editions, 
varying  in  number  from  500  to  2000,  have  appeared 
in  Spain,  and  nearly  a  hundred  more  in  America. 
It  may  be  interesting  to  consider  for  a  moment  the 
position  of  so  popular  a  poet,  the  reason  of  his 
popularity,  and  the  degree  to  which  he  deserves 
that  popularity. 

Nunez  de  Arce  is  one  of  those  many  poets  who 
expect  to  get  credit  for  the  excellent  nature  of  their 
intentions,  who  do  for  the  most  part  get  credit  for 
it,  and  who  are  genuinely  surprised  if  it  is  pointed 
out  that  in  poetry  intention  counts  for  nothing, 
apart  from  achievement.  In  the  preface  to  El 
Vertigo  he  tells  us  that  all  the  poems  he  has  hitherto 
published  are  **tentatives  in  which  I  exercise  my 
forces  and  assay  my  aptitude  for  the  various  kinds 
94 


Nunez  de  Arce. 

of  contemporary  poetry."  Thus,  La  Ultima 
Lamentacion  de  Lord  Byron  is  an  attempt  to  obtain 
the  epical  tone  in  relation  to  a  subject  of  our  own 
times ;  the  Idilio  is  an  attempt  to  write  domestic 
poetry ;  La  Selva  Osciira  is  an  attempt  to  express 
thought  under  a  symbolical  form ;  La  Vision  de 
Fray  Martin  is  an  attempt  to  unite,  "under  a  grave 
and  severe  form,  the  fantastic  and  the  supernatural 
with  the  real  and  the  transcendent."  In  the  Gritos 
del  Combate  he  develops  a  whole  theory  of  the 
mission  of  art,  in  order  to  justify  a  book  of  political 
poems ;  and  in  a  lecture  on  contemporary  poetry, 
reprinted  in  the  same  volume,  apologises  for  occupy- 
ing himself  with  aesthetic  questions  at  a  time  when 
grave  social  problems  are  troubling  the  minds  of 
men. 

This  preoccupation  with  politics,  morals,  and 
other  problems  more  suited  to  prose  than  poetry, 
is  characteristic  of  Spain,  where  it  has  always  been 
so  rare  for  a  man  of  letters  to  be  merely  a  man  of 
letters,  and  where  poets  have  so  often  been  political 
leaders  as  well.  Nufiez  de  Arce  was  appointed 
governor  of  the  province  of  Barcelona  at  the  time  of 
the  revolution  of  1868;  he  has  held  other  public 
posts  at  intervals  during  his  life ;  and  it  is  evident 
that  he  looks  at  least  as  seriously  upon  what  he 
conceives  to  have  been  his  services  to  his  country, 
as  upon  the  poems  which  he  has  written  with  such 
well-defined  intentions  of  "fulfilling  those  sacred 
duties,  and  carrying  on  that  moralising  mission," 
which  he  attributes  to  poetry.     Nowhere,  not  even 

95 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

in  England,  are  these  "serious"  views  received 
with  more  favour  than  in  Spain ;  and  a  poet  with  a 
mission,  and  with  distinctly  explained  ambitions, 
has  an  audience  always  awaiting  him. 

Nor  has  he  only  an  audience  :  the  critics  are  on 
his  side.  Nunez  de  Arce  is  a  typical  instance  of 
precisely  the  kind  of  writer  who  is  certain  of  an 
indulgent  treatment  at  the  hands  of  the  critics. 
There  is  so  httle  to  blame;  yes,  so  little  either  to 
blame  or  to  praise.  Here  is  a  poet  who  takes 
himself  seriously,  who  produces  good,  careful, 
thoughtful  work,  here  impressive  by  its  rhetoric, 
there  by  its  simplicity,  always  refined,  always 
earnest  in  its  declamation,  without  vulgarity,  or 
extravagance,  or  artificiahty,  so  often  the  faults  of 
Spanish  poetry;  he  can  write  vigorous  narrative, 
of  more  than  one  kind,  as  in  Raimundo  Lulio  and 
La  Pesca;  he  can  be  romantic  without  being  absurd, 
as  in  La  Vision  de  Fray  Martin;  he  can  write  verse 
which  is  technically  correct,  dignified,  accom- 
plished :  is  there  not  some  excuse  for  mistaking  so 
apparently  admirable  a  result  for  poetry  ^.  And 
yet  what  avail  all  the  negative  virtues,  and  all  the 
taste  in  the  world,  in  the  absence  of  the  poetic 
impulse,  poetic  energy,  the  soul  and  body  at  once  of 
poetry  ?  It  is  Hke  discussing  the  degree  to  which 
a  man  who  is  certainly  not  alive  is  dead.  Nufiez 
de  Arce  has  no  intense  inner  life,  crying  out  for 
expression;  his  emotion  is  never  personal,  but 
generalised ;  he  has  no  vision,  only  an  outlook. 
There  is  no  singing  note  in  his  voice;    every  line  is 

96 


Nunez  de  Arce. 

intellectually  realised,  line  follows  line  as  duly  as 
in  an  argument ;  but  the  exquisite  shock  or  the 
more  exquisite  peace  of  poetry  is  in  none  of  them. 
To  be  thoughtful  is  after  all  so  slight  a  merit  in  a 
poet,  unless  the  thought  is  of  some  rare  or  subtle 
kind,  a  thoughtfulness  of  the  instincts  rather  than 
of  the  reason.  Let  the  quality  of  his  thought  be 
tested  by  a  glance  at  his  epithets.  In  La  ultima 
Lamentacion  de  Lord  Byron  he  invokes  Greece : 
"Greece,  immortal  Greece!  Loving  mother  of 
heroes  and  geniuses !  Calm  fount  of  rich  inspira- 
tion !  Fruitful  spouse  of  Art !  Eternal  light  of 
the  mind ! "  Where,  in  these  epithets,  is  that 
"continual  shght  novelty"  which  poetical  style 
requires  if  it  is  to  be  poetry  ? 

And  even  his  patriotic  feeling,  strong  and  sincere 
as  it  is,  is  not  of  a  fine  poetical  quality ;  it  is  not  to 
be  compared  with  the  patriotic  feeling  of  Quintana, 
a  poet  whom  he  honours.  Quintana,  celebrating 
the  defeat  of  Trafalgar,  could  say  :  "  Para  el  pueblo 
magnanimo  no  hay  suerte."  But  Nuiiez  de  Arce, 
narrowly  political,  can  but  see  "sad  Spain,  our 
mother  Spain,  bleeding  to  death  in  the  mud  of  the 
street,"  because  a  Senate  is  Repubhcan  or  not 
Republican.  He  discusses,  he  does  not  sing;  and 
for  discussion  poetry  has  no  place.  And  his  dis- 
cussion is  a  declamatory  discussion,  as  in  the  poem 
called  Paris,  where  a  Bourgeois  and  a  Demagogue 
of  1 87 1  toss  to  and  fro  the  arguments  for  and  against 
Anarchy,  and  are  both  solemnly  rebuked  by  the  poet 
at  the  end  of  the  poem.     His  verse  is  full  of  an 

97 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

uninspired  discontent,  the  discontent  of  an  orator, 
not  the  passionate  or  ecstatic  discontent  of  the  poet : 

Hijo  del  siglo,  in  vano  me  resiste  a  su  impiedad, 
he  tells  us,  with  a  sort  of  melancholy  pride  in  repre- 
senting, as  it  seems  to  him,  so  faithfully,  a  century 
whose  materiahsing  tendencies  he  so  sincerely 
deplores.  La  Duda  {Doubt)  is  one  of  his  most 
popular  poems,  read  with  applause  on  the  occasion 
of  the  "Juegos  Florales"  of  the  Catalan  poets  in 
1868.  "In  this  age  of  sarcasm  and  doubt,  there 
is  but  one  muse,"  he  tells  us;  "the  blind,  im- 
placable, brutal  muse  of  analysis,  that,  armed  with 
the  arid  scalpel,  at  every  step  precipitates  us  into  the 
abyss,  or  brings  us  to  the  shores  of  annihilation." 
And  it  is  always  of  this  muse  that  he  is  uneasily 
conscious,  unwilling  to  follow,  and  unable  to  turn 
aside.  It  has  been  part  of  his  aim  to  write,  not 
merely  poetry,  but  modern  poetry.  But  he  comes 
to  the  task  a  moralist,  a  disbeliever  in  his  own  age, 
whose  influence  he  feels  as  a  weight  rather  than  as 
an  inspiration ;  and  he  brings  no  new  form,  he  adds 
no  flexibility  to  an  old  form.  Himself  no  new 
force,  he  has  had  the  misfortune  to  be  born  in  a 
country  lacking  in  original  forces.  For  a  Spanish 
poet  of  to-day  there  is  no  environment,  no  helpful 
tradition.  He  looks  back  on  a  literature  in  which 
there  is  not  a  single  great  or  even  remarkable  poet 
since  Calderon.  He  has  been  brought  up  on 
Espronceda,  Quintana,  Zorrilla ;  which  is  as  if  an 
EngHsh  poet  of  our  days  had  no  choice  of  models 
but  a  lesser  Byron,  a  lesser  Cowper,  and  a  lesser 
98 


Nunez  de  Arce. 

Longfellow.  He  looks  around  him,  and  discovers 
no  guiding  light  in  other  countries.  In  his  Dis- 
course on  Contemporary  Poetry,  delivered  in  1887, 
Nunez  de  Arce  gives  his  opinion  of  English,  French, 
Italian,  and  Russian  poets,  with  a  significant  pref- 
erence for  English  poets,  and  among  them  for 
Tennyson,  and  a  not  less  significant  horror  at  what 
seems  to  him  the  shamelessness  and  impiety  of 
poetry  in  France.  But  he  is  not  content  with  even 
English  poetry.  "Swinburne,"  he  tells  us,  "some- 
times sings  as  Nero  and  Cahgula  would  have  sung 
if  they  had  been  poets;"  and  he  groups  together 
Atala7ita  in  Calydon  and  Anactoria  as  poems  in  which 
"impure  passion.  Pagan  sensuality,  erotic  extrava- 
gance, acquire  monstrous  proportions,  bellowing 
Hke  wild  beasts  hungering  for  living  flesh."  Of 
Browning  he  has  Httle  to  say,  except  "que  no  siento 
por  el  admiracion  alguna."  Richepin  he  looks 
upon  as  one  of  the  typical  poets  of  France,  and  he 
repeats  the  usual  vague  phrases  about  the  Decadent 
School,  without  naming  a  single  writer,  and  with 
a  perfectly  ingenuous  lack  of  comprehension.  The 
conclusion  he  brings  back  from  his  survey  is  that 
"humanity  has  lost  its  wings,  and  walks  along 
unknown  ways,  not  knowing  whither  it  is  going." 
And  his  final  expression  of  hope  in  a  regeneration 
of  poetry,  and  of  the  world  through  poetry,  is  but  a 
phrase  of  the  rhetoric  of  despair. 

To   all   this   there   is   but   one   answer,    and   the 
answer  is  briefly  given  in  a  single  line  of  Sidney  : 
Fool,  said  my  muse  to  me,  look  in  thine  heart  and  write, 

99 


Moorish  Secrets  in  Spain. 

The  Moors,  when  they  were  driven  out  of  Spain, 
left  behind  them,  as  if  for  some  stealthy  purpose, 
many  of  their  secrets.  Wherever  you  walk,  in  the 
south  of  Spain,  you  will  come  upon  mosques, 
palaces,  towers,  gateways,  which  they  built  to  per- 
petuate themselves  in  a  strange  land,  and  you  will 
find  in  ruined  fragments  upon  hills  and  windowless 
white  houses  under  palm  trees  both  actual  remains 
and  persistent  followings  of  their  cool,  secluded 
way  of  building,  meant  for  even  fiercer  skies  and 
an  even  more  reticent  indoor  life.  Often,  as  in 
the  Giralda  by  the  side  of  the  Gothic  cathedral  at 
Seville  and  in  the  mosque  into  which  a  Christian 
church  has  been  built  at  Cordova,  you  can  see 
at  one  glance  the  conflict  or  the  contrast  of  two 
religions,  of  two  theories  of  the  universe.  The 
mosque  has  no  solemnity,  no  mystery ;  it  is  a  place 
of  closed-in  silence,  shut  in  even  from  the  sky,  in 
a  paradise  of  abstract  art.  I  think  of  the  plumage 
of  tropical  birds,  the  waving  of  palms,  a  darting 
fugue  on  the  clavichord,  to  figure  to  myself  the 
particular,  after  all  unique,  kind  of  fascination 
which  the  masterpieces  of  Arab  architecture  convey 
to  one.  Nothing  so  brilliant  was  ever  imagined 
by  a  Gothic  carver,  so  full  of  light,  so  airy,  so  ser- 
pentine in  swiftness.  A  mosque,  it  seems  to  one 
as  one  walks  among  its  pillars,  is  not  a  church  at 
all,  but  rather  a  city,  the  arcades  and  alcoves  of  a 
city  of  fiery  people,  in  whom  strength  runs  all  to 
delicacy.     The    Arabs    did    not    build    high,    they 

lOO 


Moorish  Secrets  in  Spain. 

built  wide;  and  they  sent  their  imagination  out 
like  arrows,  hither  and  thither,  in  a  flight  at  once 
random  and  mathematical.  How  singular  a  con- 
trast, is  there  not,  with  Gothic  building,  whose 
broad  base  is  set  for  a  steady  heavenward  ascension, 
yet  whose  caprices,  in  every  entertainment  to  which 
line  lends  itself,  are  all  so  material  and  of  the  earth  ! 
And  so  it  seems  to  me  that  the  architecture  of  the 
mosque  is  after  all  a  more  immaterial  worship  of 
the  idea  of  God  than  any  Christian  architecture. 
Here  there  is  invention  of  pattern,  into  which  no 
natural  object  is  ever  allowed  to  intrude,  the  true 
art  for  art's  sake,  pure  idea,  mathematics,  invention 
in  the  abstract ;  for  it  is  the  work  of  an  imagination 
intoxicated  with  itself,  finding  beginning  and  end 
in  its  own  formally  beautiful  working  out,  without 
relation  to  nature  or  humanity.  Christianity  has 
never  accepted  this  idea,  indeed  could  not ;  it  has 
always  distrusted  pure  beauty,  when  that  beauty 
has  not  been  visibly  chained  to  a  moral.  Hence  it 
has  built  its  Bibles  in  stone,  the  Gothic  cathedrals. 
But  Islam,  for  which  God  has  never  put  on  humanity, 
worships  an  immaterial  God  in  beautiful  pattern, 
which  it  appHes  equally  to  its  daily,  its  choicer 
daily  uses.  Is  not  this  more  truly  the  worship  of 
the  invisible  and  the  unimaginable,  of  what  is  highest 
in  the  idea  of  God,  than  the  Christian  worship  which 
we  see  under  the  same  roof,  with  its  divine  images 
tortured  with  sorrow,  ungracious  with  suflPering, 
which  do  but  drag  down  the  mind  from  pure  con- 
templation,   from    the   eternal   idea   to   its    human 

lOI 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

manifestation  in  time  ?     That,  at  all  events,  is  one 
of  the  secrets  of  the  Moors. 

And  they  have  left  other  secrets.  You  cannot 
walk  through  a  little  town  in  the  south  of  Spain 
without  hearing  a  strange  sound,  between  crying 
and  chanting,  which  wanders  out  to  you  from 
behind  barred  windows  and  from  among  the  tin- 
kling bells  of  the  mules.  The  Malaguefia,  they  call 
this  kind  of  singing ;  but  it  has  no  more  to  do  with 
Malaga  than  the  mosque  at  Cordova  has  to  do 
with  the  soil  on  which  it  stands.  It  is  as  Eastern 
as  the  music  of  tom-toms  and  gongs,  and,  like 
Eastern  music,  it  is  music  before  rhythm,  music 
which  comes  down  to  us  untouched  by  the  invention 
of  the  modern  scale,  from  an  antiquity  out  of  which 
plain-chant  is  a  first  step  towards  modern  harmony. 
And  this  Moorish  music  is,  Uke  Moorish  architec- 
ture, an  arabesque.  It  avoids  definite  form  just 
as  the  lines  in  stone  avoid  definite  form,  it  has  the 
same  endlessness,  motion  without  beginning  or 
end,  turning  upon  itself  in  a  kind  of  infinitely  varied 
monotony.  The  fioriture  of  the  voice  are  like 
those  coils  which  often  spring  from  a  central  point 
of  ornament,  to  twist  outward,  as  in  a  particular 
piece  of  very  delicate  work  in  the  first  mihrab  in 
the  mosque  at  Cordova.  In  both,  ensemble  is 
everything,  and  everything  is  pattern.  There  is 
the  same  avoidance  of  emphasis,  the  same  continu- 
ance on  one  level ;  no  special  part  starts  out  for 
separate  notice,  as  in  Gothic  architecture  or  Western 
music.     But   the   passion  of  this   music   is   like  no 

I02 


Moorish  Secrets  in  Spain. 

other  passion ;  fierce,  immoderate,  sustained,  it 
is  like  the  crying  of  a  wild  beast  in  suffering,  and  it 
thrills  one  precisely  because  it  seems  to  be  so  far 
from  humanity,  so  inexplicable,  so  deeply  rooted 
in  the  animal  of  which  we  are  but  one  species. 

Moorish  music  is  inarticulate,  and  so  it  brings 
a  wild  relief  which  no  articulate  music  could  ever 
bring.  It  is  the  voice  of  uncivilised  people  who 
have  the  desires  and  sorrows  common  to  every  living 
being,  and  an  unconsciousness  of  their  meaning 
which  is,  after  all,  what  we  come  back  to  after  having 
searched  through  many  meanings.  It  is  sad,  not 
because  of  personal  sorrow,  but  because  of  all  the 
sorrow  there  is,  and  always  has  been,  in  the  world. 
The  eyes  of  Spanish  women  have  something  of  the 
same  fierce  melancholy,  and  with  as  little  personal 
meaning.  It  is  a  music  which  has  not  yet  lost 
companionship  with  the  voice  of  the  wind,  the 
voice  of  the  sea,  the  voices  of  the  forest.  It  has 
never  accepted  order  and  become  art ;  it  remains 
chaotic,  elemental,  a  part  of  nature  trying  to  speak. 

The  monotony  of  this  music  (a  few  repeated 
notes  only  of  the  guitar  accompanying  it  when 
there  is  any  accompaniment  to  the  voice)  gives  it 
much  of  its  singular  effect  on  the  nerves.  It  speaks 
directly  to  the  spine,  sending  an  unaccountable 
shiver  through  one ;  without  racking  the  heart 
or  the  brain,  after  the  manner  of  most  pathos,  even 
in  sound.  The  words,  it  is  true,  are  generally 
sombre,  a  desperate  outcry;  but  the  words  of 
the  three  or  four  lines  which  go  to  make  up  a  song 

103 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

are  repeated  over  and  over,  in  varying  order,  linger- 
ing out  an  incalculable  time,  so  that  the  bare  meaning 
is  changed  into  something  of  a  pattern,  like  the 
outlines  of  a  flower  in  Moorish  architecture.  Yes, 
abstract  as  their  architecture,  their  music  has  none 
of  the  direct,  superficially  human  appeal  which 
pathetic  Western  music  has.  These  songs  are 
largely  improvisations,  and  a  singer  will  weave 
almost  any  web  of  music  about  almost  any  fragment 
of  verse :  whether  the  words  wail  because  Spain 
has  lost  Cuba  or  because  a  lover  has  lost  his  beloved, 
it  is  all  the  same ;  it  all  comes  from  the  same  deep, 
fiery  place  in  the  soil. 

Singing  and  dancing  in  Spain  are  as  the  right 
hand  and  the  left ;  and  the  same  airs,  throbbing 
on  a  guitar,  guide  the  most  characteristic  kind  of 
dancing.  Here  the  meaning  is  more  explicit ; 
like  the  pantomime  of  all  Eastern  dancing,  like  the 
shapeless  jog-trot  of  the  Soudanese,  which  you 
can  see  at  Earl's  Court,  like  the  undisguised  mimicry 
of  the  women  in  the  Rue  du  Caire  at  the  last  Paris 
Exhibition,  it  is  wholly  sexual.  But  in  the  dancing, 
inherited  from  the  Moors,  which  the  gipsies  have 
perfected  in  Spain,  there  is  far  more  subtlety, 
delicacy,  and  real  art  than  in  the  franker  posturing 
of  Egypt  and  Arabia.  It  is  the  most  elaborate 
dancing  in  the  world,  and,  like  the  music,  it  has  an 
abstract  quality  which  saves  it  from  ever,  for  a 
moment,  becoming  vulgar.  As  I  have  watched 
a  Gitana  dancing  in  Seville,  I  have  thought  of  the 
sacred  dances  which  in  most  religions  have  given 
104 


Moorish  Secrets  in  Spain. 

a  perfectly  solemn  and  collected  symbolism  to  the 
creative  forces  of  the  world.  Hieratic,  not  per- 
verse, centred  upon  the  central  fact  of  existence ; 
moving  gravely,  without  frivolity,  in  a  sense  without 
passion,  so  deeply  is  the  passion  rooted  in  the 
nature  of  things ;  the  dance  coils  round  upon  itself 
as  the  trails  of  music  and  the  trails  in  stone  coil 
round  upon  themselves.  It  is  another  secret  of 
the  Moors,  and  must  remain  as  mysterious  to  us 
as  those  other  secrets,  until  we  have  come  a  little 
closer  than  we  have  yet  come  to  the  immaterial 
wisdom  of  the  East. 

Autumn,  1899. 


los 


Valencia. 

Past  the  deserts,  orange  groves,  and  watered 
gardens,  winding  up  and  down  between  low  jagged 
hills  and  the  sea,  which,  against  the  red  soil  about 
Cabafial  and  the  harbour,  is  often  blood-red,  sud- 
denly, turning  inland,  we  are  in  Valencia.  It  was 
dark  when  I  reached  it,  and  I  have  never  seen, 
except  point  by  point  in  its  midst,  this  city  of  tall 
towers  and  blue  domes.  I  have  followed  all  its 
windings,  and  on  every  side  it  dwindles  out  to 
dusty  and  cheerless  boulevards,  a  half-dry  river- 
bed, gardens  with  palms  and  all  manner  of  sHm, 
feathery  trees,  thirsty  for  lack  of  rain,  and  grey 
with  dust.  It  is  a  maze  of  tall  and  narrow  streets, 
in  which  houses  of  irregular  height  and  size,  and 
colour  and  style,  follow  one  another  with  a  uniform 
profusion  of  balconies,  all  with  their  shutters  or 
their  persianas;  here  and  there  four  or  five  streets 
debouch  into  an  oddly  shaped  square,  for  the  most 
part  a  mere  space  between  street  and  street,  and 
for  the  most  part  with  a  church  at  one  of  its  corners. 
There  are  whole  streets  of  shops,  every  shop  with 
its  little  oval  signboard,  painted  with  the  image 
of  a  saint ;  every  shop  open  to  the  street,  and  hung 
outside  with  sashes,  and  plaids,  and  lengths  of 
cloth  and  velvet,  and  shawls,  and  blankets,  and 
every  kind  of  long,  bright  stuff.  And,  stagnant 
amidst  the  constant  flowing  of  busy  life,  to  and  fro 
in  these  vivid,  narrow  streets,  a  beggar  stands  at 
every  crossing;  men  with  a  horrible  absence  of 
hands,  men  without  legs,  men  doubled  up,  and 
1 06 


Val 


encia. 


twisted  into  strange  shapes,  hopping  Hke  frogs, 
bUnd  men,  men  sitting  against  the  wall  with  cloaks 
drawn  over  their  faces,  old  men  tottering  with  age, 
women  carrying  sick  children,  or  with  children 
running  beside  them  with  little  tin  plates  in  their 
hands. 

Valencia  is  both  old  and  new,  and  much  in  it 
seems  to  be  at  once  old  and  new.  The  people 
are  busy,  thriving,  but  they  work  with  their  hands, 
not  with  machinery,  and  they  work  almost  in  the 
open  air,  in  shops  laid  open  like  Eastern  bazaars, 
in  great  doorways,  where  whole  families  assemble 
with  their  chairs,  or  sitting  on  balconies,  in  the 
Spanish  fashion,  with  their  backs  to  the  street. 
The  women  pass,  bare-headed,  in  their  bright 
clothes,  on  their  tiny  feet,  carrying  pitchers  to  the 
fountain,  and  pitchers  of  beautiful  ancient  form, 
like  two-handed  amphorae.  They  pass,  dressed  in 
black,  with  their  black  mantillas  and  their  fans,  on 
their  way  to  the  churches,  to  which  they  are  always 
going,  and  from  which  they  are  always  coming. 
And  in  the  men's  handkerchiefs,  twisted  into  a 
turban,  with  a  hanging  tail ;  in  many  of  the  faces, 
in  which  brown  blackens  to  so  dark  a  shade ;  in 
fingers  and  finger-nails,  stained  like  a  negro's,  I  see 
the  Moors,  still  unconquered  in  Spain. 

And  the  colour !  I  have  never  seen  so  much 
colour  in  any  streets  before,  except  indeed  in  the 
streets  of  Moscow,  where  it  hurts.  Here  it  is 
bright,  moving,  not  insistent,  and  clothing  gay  life. 
I    like   to   walk    in   the    market-place   on    a    sunny 

107 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

morning,  among  those  white  stalls,  set  up  with 
coverings  like  sails,  at  which  brown  women  sit  in 
their  comfortable  chairs,  laughing,  calling  to  one 
another,  fanning  the  fruit  to  keep  off  the  cloud  of 
flies  and  mosquitos.  There  is  a  ceaseless  noise, 
passing,  sound  of  voices ;  bright  dresses,  shawls, 
aprons  throng  the  pavement  and  the  roadway ; 
every  one,  as  people  do  in  Spain,  is  hurrying  leisurely ; 
they  are  at  once  serious  and  good-humoured,  as 
Spanish  people  are.  And  this  coloured  crowd  is 
moving  under  the  shadow  of  the  Lonja,  with  its 
delicate  fifteenth-century  Gothic  (still,  as  naturally 
as  ever,  the  Exchange),  and  before  the  barbaric 
rococo  of  the  church  of  Los  Santos  Juanes,  in  the 
one  spacious  square  of  Valencia,  where,  in  the  days 
of  the  Cid,  tournaments  were  held,  and  men  have 
been  burned  alive. 

This  living  on  of  the  Middle  Ages,  in  a  busy 
town,  into  the  present,  came  home  to  me  with  singu- 
lar force  one  Thursday  morning  as  I  went  to  the 
Cathedral  Square  to  see  the  Tribunal  of  the  Waters. 
Outside  the  Apostles'  Door  an  iron  railing  had  been 
set  up  on  the  broad  pavement,  and,  within  the 
railing,  an  old-fashioned  sofa,  semicircular  in  form, 
had  been  placed ;  and  at  half-past  eleven  six  old 
men,  peasants,  took  their  seats,  bare-headed,  in 
their  peasants'  blouses.  Then  two  peasants  came 
forward,  entered  the  enclosure,  and  each  stated 
his  case  briefly.  The  case  was  heard,  discussed, 
and  decided  in  five  minutes.  The  six  old  men 
sat  there  leaning  forward  on  their  sticks,  listening 
lo8 


Valencia. 

attentively,  for  the  most  part  saying  nothing, 
tacitly  accepting  the  judgment  of  their  president, 
a  keen-faced,  unhesitating  man,  who  sat  with  his 
head  bent,  and  his  eyes  raised  scrutinisingly,  never 
moving  from  the  face  of  the  man  before  him.  His 
decision  has  the  force  of  law,  and  this  tribunal, 
which,  since  the  time  of  the  Moors,  has  sat  here 
every  Thursday  at  half-past  eleven  to  decide  all 
questions  relating  to  the  watering  of  the  lands,  is 
a  remnant  of  mediaeval  democracy,  peasants  judging 
peasants,  which  is  not  the  least  surprising  of  popular 
survivals. 

Another  morning  I  seemed  to  myself  more  than 
ever  in  the  Middle  Ages,  as  I  attended  a  Latin 
discussion  in  the  cathedral,  when  D.  Tariny  Rafael 
Torres  propounded  the  thesis  that  three  things  are 
needed  for  a  perfect  repentance :  oris  co7ifessioy 
cordis  contritio,  atque  operis  satisfactioy  and  the  Sres. 
Martinez  and  Fuset  disputed  the  thesis.  Against 
the  entrance  to  the  choir,  over  which  hung  a  lighted 
lamp,  a  carpet  had  been  laid,  on  which  was  placed 
a  row  of  crimson-covered  arm-chairs  and  a  table 
covered  with  crimson  cloth.  Opposite,  imme- 
diately against  the  door  of  the  principal  entrance, 
a  movable  pulpit  had  been  set  up,  also  hung  with 
crimson,  and  standing  on  a  high  wooden  frame,  to 
which  steps  led  at  the  back.  On  both  sides  were 
benches  for  the  audience.  Six  church  dignitaries, 
in  their  crimson  and  ermine  robes,  sat  on  the  seats 
at  the  table,  one  or  two  others  at  the  side,  and  the 
disputants  on  an  ancient  leather-covered  settle  on 

109 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

the  right  of  the  pulpit.  The  orator  was  led  in  with 
ceremony.  He  spoke,  seated,  for  exactly  an  hour. 
After  he  had  spoken,  the  younger  of  the  two  dis- 
putants, a  man  with  the  face  of  an  intellectual 
fighter,  rose  with  his  first  co?itra.  He  spoke  rapidly, 
almost  disdainfully,  with  a  suppressed  smile,  as 
he  proposed  his  difficult  questions.  I  left  after 
nearly  two  hours,  while  the  older  of  the  two 
disputants  was  proposing  his  objections.  I  found 
Latin  surprisingly  like  Spanish,  when  pronounced 
with  a  Spanish  accent,  the  Spanish  lisp  and  gutturals  : 
nunquam,  for  instance,  sounding  hke  the  Spanish 
nuncdy  etiam  like  ethiam.  And  the  audience,  that, 
too,  reminded  me  of  what  those  audiences  must 
have  been  that  flocked  to  hear  the  Schoolmen.  On 
and  around  the  benches,  in  a  dense  mass  on  each 
side,  were  priests  and  students,  a  certain  number 
of  men  who  had  probably  once  been  students,  and 
then  boys,  old  men,  women,  beggars  —  people  who 
certainly  could  not  understand  a  word  that  was 
said,  but  gazing,  and  apparently  listening,  with 
rapt  attention,  as  if  to  a  strange  religious  service, 
quite  out  of  the  usual  course,  which  it  was  partly 
curious  and  partly  pious  to  attend.  One  old 
woman,  not  far  from  me,  knelt. 

The  churches  of  Valencia,  so  numerous,  and 
filled  during  all  the  hours  of  service  with  so  constant 
a  devotion,  are  of  but  moderate  value  architecturally, 
apart  from  the  curiosity  of  their  structure,  in  such 
churches  as  San  Andres  and  San  Nicolas,  where 
the  original  form  of  the  mosques,  out  of  which 
no 


Val 


encia. 


they  have  been  built,  still  persists,  almost  unaltered. 
Many  churches,  once  Gothic,  have  been  spoiled 
out  of  recognition ;  plaster  and  whitewash  and  gold 
paint  have  been  at  work  on  almost  every  interior ; 
and  the  few  good  pictures  which  might  be  seen, 
the  Ribaltas,  Juanes,  an  interesting  Goya,  are  put 
into  dark  corners,  where  it  is  impossible  to  see 
them  properly.  The  Cathedral  itself,  built  on 
the  site  of  a  mosque,  and  seen  at  its  best  in  the  bell- 
tower  and  cimborio,  which  rise  very  effectively 
against  different  aspects  of  the  sky,  has  suffered 
restoration,  and  its  principal  entrance  is  now  tawdry 
with  meaningless  ornament.  The  one  satisfying 
piece  of  Gothic  here  is  in  none  of  the  churches,  but 
in  the  Lonja,  with  its  pillars  spiring  to  the  roof 
and  branching  out  into  stone  palm  trees,  with  a 
really  broad  effect  of  delicacy.  Renaissance  archi- 
tecture is  but  just  seen  in  the  audiencia;  and,  in 
the  palace  on  which  I  am  looking  out  as  I  write, 
a  terrible  example  of  eighteenth-century  barocco, 
a  very  masterpiece  of  the  art  of  heaping  up  the 
unnecessary.  The  river  of  Valencia,  the  Turia, 
which,  strictly  speaking,  scarcely  exists,  is  to  me 
almost  the  most  fascinating  thing  here,  framing 
in  the  picture  I  make  for  myself  of  this  intricate 
place,  with  an  effect  that  pleases  me.  The  river 
banks,  with  their  stone  quays,  are  wide  enough 
for  the  Seine,  and  the  Turia  is  a  thread  of  water 
lost  in  the  sand.  The  dry  river-bed  is  a  mass  of 
brown  sand,  like  the  seashore ;  trees  grow  on  each 
side  and  grass   about  the  trees ;    the  horse-market 

III 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

is  held  here  in  the  morning,  carts  pass  to  and  fro, 
cattle  lie  there  on  heaped  straw,  soldiers  gallop 
over  it  on  their  horses,  black  sheep  wander  along 
it  in  a  fantastic  dark  crowd,  the  dust  rising  whitely 
from  under  their  little  hoofs.  And  there  are 
moments  when  the  thin  stream,  flowing  in  and  out 
among  the  sand,  touches  all  these  colours  with  an 
exquisite  light,  drawing  into  itself  the  green  of 
the  trees,  and  shining  daintily  amidst  the  dust. 
In  such  moments  one  seems  to  see  Africa,  the  desert 
and  the  oasis. 

Under  a  stormy  sky  the  river-bed  has  a  wild 
and  savage  aspect,  its  brown  sand  reddening  under 
the  dark  clouds,  droves  of  black  cattle  roaming 
over  it,  the  wind  stirring  in  the  leaves  of  the  trees  ; 
and  one  night  I  saw  across  it  one  of  the  most  original 
sunsets  I  had  ever  seen ;  a  sunset  in  brown.  Stand- 
ing on  the  bridge  next  beyond  the  Moorish  "  Bridge 
of  the  Law"  and  looking  towards  the  Gate  of 
Serranos,  with  its  fourteenth-century  battlements, 
every  line  distinct  against  a  rim  of  pale  green  sky, 
I  saw  the  clouds  heaped  above  them  in  great  loose 
masses  of  brown,  nothing  but  shades  of  brown, 
and  every  shade  of  brown.  It  was  as  if  the  light 
smouldered,  as  if  an  inner  flame  scorched  the  white 
clouds,  as  flame  scorches  paper,  until  it  shrivels 
into  an  angry,  crackling  brown.  Under  these 
loose  masses  of  brown  cloud  the  battlemented  gate, 
the  tall  houses,  a  square  and  narrow  tower  which 
rose  beyond  them,  darkened  to  exactly  the  same 
colour    in    shadow;     and    all    but    the    upper    part 

112 


Val 


encia. 


vanished  away  into  complete  darkness,  which 
extended  outwards  over  the  trees  on  the  quay  and 
over  a  part  of  the  dry  river-bed,  coming  suddenly 
to  an  end  just  before  the  water  began.  The  thin 
stream  was  coloured  a  deep  purple,  where  the 
reflection  of  the  clouds  fell  right  upon  it ;  and 
higher  up,  where  a  foot-bridge  crossed  the  river, 
reversed  shadows  walked  in  greenish  water,  step 
for  step  with  the  passers  on  the  bridge.  It  was 
long  before  the  light  faded  out  of  the  clouds,  which 
sank  to  a  paler  and  paler  yellow;  and  I  stood  there 
thrilled  with  admiration  of  those  violent  and  daring 
harmonies,  which  seemed  to  carry  Nature  beyond 
her  usual  scheme  of  colour,  in  what  I  could  not 
help  almost  hearing  as  the  surge  of  a  Wagnerian 
orchestra. 

Winter,  1898. 


113 


Tarragona. 


Seen  from  the  sea,  Tarragona  is  a  cluster  of  grey- 
houses,  full  of  windows,  on  a  hill  rising  steeply 
from  the  shore ;  and  the  grey  houses  climb  to  a 
yellow  point,  the  Cathedral.  At  the  foot  of  the  hill 
the  black  line  of  railway  crosses  a  strip  of  ruinous 
land,  from  which  the  abrupt  rock  goes  up  to  the 
Paseo  de  Santa  Clara ;  and,  leaning  there  over  the 
railings,  one  looks  down  on  that  strip  of  ruinous  land, 
whitened  harshly  by  the  great  open  square  of  the 
prison,  whenever  one  looks  seawards. 
^-  And,  indeed,  all  Tarragona  is  expressed  in  those 
two  words,  ruins  and  the  sea.  Whichever  way  one 
follows  it,  it  ends  in  half-hewn  rock,  and  in  a  new 
aspect  of  the  sea,  and  it  is  built  out  of  the  ruins  of  a 
Roman  colony.  The  Roman  walls  themselves,  of 
which  such  considerable  ^fragments  remain,  rise  on 
the  foundations  of  a  Cyclopean  wall,  built  of  vast 
unhewn  masses  of  stone ;  the  Cathedral  stands  on 
the  site  of  a  Moorish  mosque ;  a  public  square,  lined 
with  houses,  the  Plaza  de  Fuente,  still  keeps  the 
form  of  the  Roman  circus.  Most  of  the  houses 
in  the  old  town  are  made  out  of  the  ruins  of  Roman 
houses,  modern  windows  break  out  in  solid  Roman 
walls,  left  to  end  where  ruin  left  them  to  end ; 
there  are  Roman  fountains  in  the  squares,  Roman 
tombstones  are  built  into  the  walls  of  the  Arch- 
bishop's palace,  fragments  of  triumphal  arches  are 
set  into  the  walls  about  Roman  gateways ;  the 
"Tower  of  Charles  V."  comes  up  from  the  tiled 
roof  of  the  Arsenal,  and  "Pilate's  Tower,"  once 
H4 


Tarragona. 

part  of  the  Palace  of  Augustus,  is  a  prison.  And 
out  of  all  these  ruins  of  great  things  there  has  come, 
for  the  most  part,  only  something  itself  dilapidated, 
to  which  the  ruins  lend  no  splendour.  They  exist, 
but  half  themselves,  as  if  unwillingly  made  a  part 
of  the  stagnant  hfe  about  them,  unwiUingly  closing 
in  the  coloured  movement  of  markets,  the  rapid, 
short  steps  of  Spanish  soldiers.  They  have  seen 
narrow  streets  come  up  in  their  midst,  twisting  be- 
tween them,  winding  up  and  down  steps,  and  around 
corners,  and  jutting  out  into  irregular  squares  and 
odd  triangles;  doorways,  windows,  busy  iron  bal- 
conies, flat  roofs,  the  whole  idly  active  Spanish  life 
open  to  the  street,  or  disappearing  behind  green 
persianas;  and  they  see  the  Spaniards  still  quarrymg 
about  them,  restless,  and  leaving  their  impoverished, 
fragmentary  city  still  unfinished. 

Yet  Tarragona  has  its  one  marvel,  the  Cathedral, 
as  the  Cathedral  has  itself  its  marvel,  the  cloisters. 
Its  fa9ade,  coloured  the  brown  of  the  earth,  and 
warmed  with  a  tinge  of  almost  ruddy  gold,  fills  the 
whole  space  of  sky  at  the  end  of  the  steep  street  by 
which  one  approaches  it,  whose  narrow  fines  indeed 
cut  into  the  great  rose-window,  and  the  arched 
Gothic  portal,  in  which  the  Virgin  and  Child  stand 
in  the  midst  of  prophets  and  apostles,  carved  simply 
and  devoutly  by  the  thirteenth-century  sculptor, 
who  has  set  over  them  a  Last  Judgment  in  relief, 
crowded  with  small,  indistinguishable  dead,  while 
the  great  saints  —  each  saint  distinct  with  his  written 
history  beside  him  —  rise  visibly  from  their  coffins, 

115 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  two  flying  angels  blow  long  trumpets  above 
their  heads.  Walking  round  it,  by  ways  which 
lose  and  find  it  again,  we  see  the  long,  irregular, 
late  Romanesque  structure,  like  house  added  to 
house,  with  its  low  octagonal  turret,  exactly  the 
deep,  rich  colour  of  plum  pudding.  Inside,  the 
church,  with  less  of  that  properly  Spanish  mystery 
which  we  find  in  the  Cathedral  at  Barcelona,  for 
example,  has  an  ample  dignity,  and  at  night,  before 
the  altar  candles  are  lit,  becomes  splendid  in  shadow. 
In  its  detail,  in  the  gradual  accumulation  of  structure 
and  ornament,  the  statues  of  the  retablo,  the  windows, 
doorways,  columns,  it  is  in  itself  an  almost  complete 
historical  museum  of  Spanish  art  in  stone.  But  it 
is,  after  all,  in  the  cloisters  that  one  cares  chiefly  to 
linger.  To  walk  there,  looking  between  the  slim 
white  columns,  with  their  history  of  the  Bible  or 
of  the  world  carved  minutely  and  with  mediaeval 
humour  on  the  capitals;  looking  past  them  into 
that  inner  court  where  a  garden  of  trees  and  shrubs 
blossoms  with  many  greens  —  the  green  of  palm,  of 
cypress,  of  oleander;  in  that  coolness  under  the 
sunshine  visible  upon  the  foliage,  is  to  surrender 
oneself  to  an  enchanted  peace.  Here  Tarragona  at 
least  still  sleeps  perfectly,  in  that  permanent  dream 
of  the  Middle  Ages. 

Ruins  and  the  sea,  I  have  said,  make  up  most  of 
Tarragona;  and  the  sea  here  has  some  particular 
charm  of  its  own,  new  to  me,  after  all  I  have  seen 
of  the  sea.  A  wide  rambla,  planted  with  trees, 
where,  in  the  afternoon,  every  one  walks,  leads  to 
ii6 


Tarragona. 

that  iron  railing  at  the  cliff's  edge  from  which,  but 
for  the  pedestal  of  a  modern  statue,  one  could  look 
right  through  the  new  town  to  the  open  country 
and  the  vine-covered  hills  of  the  Priorato.  To  the 
right  is  the  harbour,  with  its  long  curving  mole; 
to  the  left,  a  little  neck  of  land  runs  out  into  the  sea, 
making  a  kind  of  tiny  bay ;  in  front,  the  unlimited 
sea.  At  night  the  gaslight  mole  becomes  a  horseshoe 
with  golden  nails,  the  little  neck  of  land  might  be 
the  first  glimpse  of  a  desert  island.  Something  in 
the  point  from  which  one  looks  down  on  it,  the  sense 
of  being  almost  theatrically  perched  on  the  edge  of 
a  great  balcony,  helps,  no  doubt,  to  make  one  look 
on  this  view  of  the  sea  as  a  great  spectacle,  arranged 
against  a  magnificent  moving  background  of  clouds. 
Certainly  I  never  saw  the  clouds  dispose  themselves 
with  so  conscious  an  air  of  being  scenery,  a  back- 
ground, as  about  that  vast  plain  of  blue  sea,  pillaring 
a  kind  of  fleecy  dome  over  it.  And  the  strip  of 
black  ruinous  land  made  its  own  line  of  footlights, 
dark-coloured  for  contrast  with  that  watery,  and 
variable,  and  gentle  brilliance. 

It  is  certain  that  the  expressive  quality  of  Tarra- 
gona comes  out,  not  only  in  the  union,  but  in  the 
emphatic  contrast,  of  sea  and  ruins.  And  that 
particular  harsh  spot  on  the  shore,  the  great  prison, 
"El  Milagro,"  has  its  own  singular  value  in  the 
composition.  One  looks  down,  from  those  railings, 
on  the  whole  inner  court,  open  to  the  sky,  and  painted 
sky-blue,  where  a  line  of  prisoners  sits  in  the  sun, 
wearing   broad-brimmed   straw   hats,    rope-making, 

117 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  the  others  stroll  about,  drink  out  of  earthen 
pitchers,  or  sit  on  great  stones,  all  over  the  court, 
or  with  their  backs  against  the  doors  of  the  prison- 
chapel.  They  have  hung  up  their  coats  on  nails 
in  the  wall,  and  they  lounge  there  in  their  shirt- 
sleeves, and  white  sandal-shoes,  exactly  as  they 
would  lounge  in  their  own  doorways.  Outside  the 
high  white  walls,  soldiers,  with  fixed  bayonets, 
stand  on  guard ;  and  at  night,  after  the  prison  is 
silent  behind  its  grated  windows,  one  hears  their 
long  cry  of  Alerta  echoing  other  voices  from  up  the 
hill.  And  that  centre  of  lives  that  have  come  to 
grief,  all  that  pent-up  violence,  is  set  there  between 
the  city  and  the  sea,  for  idle  people  to  look  down 
upon  all  day ;  and  all  day  long,  beggars,  or  children, 
or  casual  passers,  stand  leaning  over  those  railings, 
staring  down  into  the  prison-yard.  As  many  people, 
I  think,  look  at  the  prison  as  at  the  sea ;  some  of 
them  cannot  see  the  sea  for  the  prison,  and  their 
eyes  stop  there  on  the  way.  And  for  every  one 
who  looks  at  the  sea  there  is  the  prison  thrusting 
itself  between  one's  sight  and  the  sea,  more  desolate 
than  any  ruin,  a  wicked  spot  which  one  cannot  wipe 
off  from  the  earth. 

W inter  i  1898. 


118 


Cordova. 

Seen  from  the  further  end  of  the  Moorish  bridge 
by  the  Calahorra,  where  the  road  starts  to  Seville, 
Cordova  is  a  long  brown  hne  between  the  red  river 
and  the  purple  hills,  an  irregular,  ruinous  Hne, 
following  the  windings  of  the  river,  and  rising  to 
the  yellow  battlements  and  great  middle  bulk  of  the 
cathedral.  It  goes  up  sheer  from  the  river-side, 
above  a  broken  wall,  and  in  a  huddle  of  mean 
houses,  with  so  lamentably  picturesque  an  air  that 
no  one  would  expect  to  find,  inside  that  rough 
exterior,  such  neat,  clean,  shining  streets,  kept,  even 
in  the  poorest  quarters,  with  so  admirable  a  care, 
and  so  bright  with  flowers  and  foliage,  in  patios  and 
on  upper  balconies.  From  the  bridge  one  sees  the 
Moorish  mills,  rising  yellow  out  of  the  yellow  water, 
and,  all  day  long,  there  is  a  slow  procession  along  it 
of  mules  and  donkeys,  with  their  red  saddles, 
carrying  their  burdens,  and  sometimes  men  heavily 
draped  in  great  blanket-cloaks.  Cross  the  city,  and 
come  out  on  the  Paseo  de  la  Victoria,  open  to  the 
Sierra  Morena,  and  you  are  in  an  immense  village- 
green  with  red  and  white  houses  on  one  side,  and 
black  wooded  hills  on  every  other  side ;  the  trees, 
when  I  saw  it  for  the  first  time  at  the  beginning  of 
winter,  already  shivering,  and  the  watchers  sitting 
on  their  chairs  with  their  cloaks  across  their  faces. 

All  Cordova  seems  to  exist  for  its  one  treasure, 
the  mosque,  and  to  exist  for  it  in  a  kind  of  remem- 
brance ;  it  is  white,  sad,  delicately  romantic,  set  in 
the  midst  of  a  strange,  luxuriant  country,  under  the 

119 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

hills,  and  beside  the  broad  Guadalquivir,  which, 
seen  at  sunset  from  the  Ribera,  flows  with  so  fantastic 
a  violence  down  its  shallow  weirs,  between  the  mills 
and  beneath  the  arches  of  the  Moors.  The  streets 
are  narrow  and  roughly  paved,  and  they  turn  on 
themselves  like  a  maze,  around  blank  walls,  past 
houses  with  barred  windows  and  open  doors, 
through  which  one  sees  a  flowery  patio,  and  by  little 
irregular  squares,  in  which  the  grass  is  sometimes 
growing  between  the  stones,  and  outside  the  doors 
of  great  shapeless  churches,  mounting  and  descend- 
ing steeply,  from  the  river-bank  to  the  lanes  and 
meadows  beyond  the  city  walls.  Turn  and  turn 
long  enough  through  the  white  solitude  of  these 
narrow  streets,  and  you  come  on  the  dim  arcades 
and  tall  houses  of  the  market-place,  and  on  alleys 
of  shops  and  bazaars,  bright  with  coloured  things, 
crimson  umbrellas,  such  as  every  one  carries  here, 
cloaks  lined  with  crimson  velvet,  soft  brown  leather, 
shining  silver-work.  The  market  is  like  a  fair; 
worthless,  picturesque  lumber  is  heaped  all  over 
the  ground,  and  upon  stalls,  and  in  dark  shops  like 
caves :  steel  and  iron  and  leather  goods,  vivid 
crockery-ware,  roughly  burnt  into  queer,  startling 
patterns,  old  clothes,  cheap  bright  handkerchiefs 
and  scarves.  Passing  out  through  the  market- 
place, one  comes  upon  sleepier  streets,  dwindling 
into  the  suburbs ;  grass  grows  down  the  whole 
length  of  the  street,  and  the  men  and  women  sit  in 
the  middle  of  the  road  in  their  chairs,  the  children, 
more  solemnly,  in  their  little  chairs.  Vehicles  pass 
1 20 


Cordova. 

seldom,  and  only  through  certain  streets,  where  a 
board  tells  them  it  is  possible  to  pass;  but  mules 
and  donkeys  are  always  to  be  seen,  in  long  tinkling 
lines,  nodding  their  wise  little  heads,  as  they  go  on 
their  own  way  by  themselves.  At  night  Cordova 
sleeps  early ;  a  few  central  streets  are  still  busy 
with  people,  but  the  rest  are  all  deserted,  the  houses 
look  empty,  there  is  an  almost  oppressive  silence. 
Only,  here  and  there,  as  one  passes  heedlessly  along 
a  quiet  street,  one  comes  suddenly  upon  a  cloaked 
figure,  with  a  broad-brimmed  hat,  leaning  against 
the  bars  of  a  window,  and  one  may  catch,  through 
the  bars,  a  ghmpse  of  a  vivid  face,  dark  hair,  and  a 
rose  (an  artificial  rose)  in  the  hair.  Not  in  any  part 
of  Spain  have  I  seen  the  traditional  Spanish  love- 
making,  the  cloak  and  hat  at  the  barred  window, 
so  frankly  and  so  delightfully  on  view.  It  brings  a 
touch  of  genuine  romance,  which  it  is  almost  difficult 
for  those  who  know  comic  opera  better  than  the 
countries  in  which  life  is  still,  in  its  way,  a  serious 
travesty,  to  take  quite  seriously.  Lovers'  faces,  on 
each  side  of  the  bars  of  a  window,  at  night,  in  a 
narrow  street  of  white  houses  :  that,  after  all,  and 
not  even  the  miraculous  mosque,  may  perhaps  be 
the  most  vivid  recollection  that  one  brings  away 
with  one  from  Cordova. 

Winter,  1898. 


121 


Montserrat. 

Like  one  not  yet  awakened  from  a  dream  I  seemed 
to  myself  while  I  was  still  in  Montserrat ;  and  now, 
having  left  it,  I  seem  to  have  awakened  from  the 
dream.  One  of  those  few  exquisite,  impossible 
places  which  exist,  properly,  only  in  our  recollection 
of  them,  Montserrat  is  still  that  place  of  refuge 
which  our  dreams  are ;  and  is  it  not  itself  a  dream 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  Monsalvat,  the  castle  of  the 
Holy  Graal,  which  men  have  beheved  to  be  not  in 
the  world,  and  to  contain  something  not  of  the 
world,  seeing  it  poised  so  near  heaven,  among  so 
nearly  inaccessible  rocks,  in  the  lonely  hollow  of  a 
great  plain  ?  Solidly  based  on  the  fifteen  miles 
which  encircle  it,  the  mountain  goes  up  suddenly, 
in  terrace  after  terrace,  with  a  sort  of  ardent  vigour, 
close-pressed  columns  of  rock  springing  step  by 
step  higher  into  the  air,  pausing  for  a  moment 
where  the  Monastery  stands  on  its  narrow  ledge, 
2900  feet  high,  and  then  going  on  for  another 
thousand  feet,  ending  in  great  naked  fingers  of  rock 
which  point  to  the  sky.  The  tall,  bare  buildings 
of  the  monastery  are  built  of  yellow  stone,  and,  seen 
from  a  distance,  seem  to  become  almost  a  part  of 
the  mountain  itself,  in  which  the  grey  stone  is  ruddy- 
hearted,  like  the  colour  of  the  soil  at  its  feet.  And 
as  the  monastery  seems  to  become  almost  a  part  of 
the  mountain,  so  the  rock  itself  takes  the  aspect  of 
a  castle,  a  palace;  especially  at  night,  when  one 
seems  to  look  up  at  actual  towers  overtopping  the 
tall  buildings.  And  from  this  narrow  ledge  between 
122 


Montserrat. 

heaven  and  earth,  a  mere  foothold  on  a  great  rock, 
one  looks  up  only  at  sheer  peaks,  and  down  only 
into  veiled  chasms,  or  over  mountainous  walls  to 
a  great  plain,  ridged  as  if  the  naked  ribs  of  the  earth 
were  laid  bare,  the  red  and  grey  soil  spotted  dark 
with  trees,  here  and  there  whitened  with  houses, 
furrowed  by  a  yellow  river,  the  white  line  of  roads 
barely  visible,  man's  presence  only  marked  by  here 
and  there  a  little  travelling  smoke,  disappearing 
into  the  earth,  insect-like,  or,  insect-like,  crawling 
black  on  its  surface. 

With  all  its  vastness,  abruptness,  and  fantastic 
energy,  Montserrat  is  never  savage ;  it  is  always 
forming  naturally  into  beautiful,  unexpected  shapes, 
miracles  of  form,  by  a  sort  of  natural  genius  in  it  for 
formal  expression.  And  this  form  is  never  violent, 
is  always  subtly  rounded,  even  when  it  is  bare  grey 
rocks  ;  and  often  breaks  out  dehciously  into  verdure, 
which  is  the  ornament  on  form.  There  is  some- 
thing in  it,  indeed,  at  times,  of  the  highest  kind  of 
grotesque,  pointing  fingers,  rocks  which  have  grown 
almost  human ;  but  in  all  this  there  is  nothing 
trivial,  for  here  the  grotesque  becomes  for  once  a 
new,  powerful  kind  of  beauty.  From  the  height  of 
S.  Jeronimo,  the  highest  point  of  the  mountain,  a 
whole  army  of  beckoning  and  threatening  rocks 
comes  up  about  one,  climbing  gigantically,  among 
sheer  precipices,  tumultuously,  in  that  place  of  great 
echoes.  But  they  have  the  beauty  of  wild  things, 
of  those  animals  which  are  only  half  uncouth  until 
man   has  tamed   them,   and   shut  them   up   in  the 

123 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

awkwardness  of  prisoners.  And  they  are  solem- 
nised too,  by  the  visible  height  to  which  they  have 
climbed  into  the  serene  air,  out  of  a  plain  that  rolls 
away,  curve  on  curve,  grey  and  ruddy,  to  the  snow 
of  the  Pyrenees,  and  the  broad,  glittering,  milk- 
white  line  of  the  Mediterranean, 

But  the  beauty  of  Montserrat  lies  in  no  detail, 
can  be  explained  by  no  analysis:  it  is  the  beauty 
of  a  conscious  soul,  exquisite,  heroic,  sacred,  ancient, 
in  the  midst  of  the  immemorable  peace,  dignity,  and 
endurance  of  high  mountains.  Without  the  mon- 
astery, the  pilgrims,  the  worship  of  the  Virgin,  the 
chanting  of  the  monks  and  of  the  Escolania  (that 
school  of  ecclesiastical  music  which  has  existed  here 
since  the  twelfth  century),  Montserrat  would  be  a 
strange,  beautiful  thing  indeed,  a  piece  of  true 
picturesque,  but  no  more,  not  the  unique  thing  that 
it  is.  Quite  out  of  the  world,  singularly  alone,  one 
is  in  the  presence  of  a  great  devotion ;  and  in  the 
pilgrims  who  come  here,  humble  people  with  the 
grave  and  friendly  gaiety  of  the  Spaniard  I  found 
the  only  perfectly  sympathetic  company  I  have  ever 
found  about  me  in  travelling.  Life  is  reduced  to 
its  extreme  simplicity  :  the  white-washed  cell,  the 
attendance  on  oneself,  the  day  marked  only  by  one's 
wanderings  over  the  mountain,  or  by  the  hours  of 
worship.  I  went  one  morning  to  the  "visitation 
of  the  Virgin,"  when  the  dark  image  is  unveiled 
for  the  kisses  of  the  pilgrims ;  and  I  saw  in  the 
sacristy  the  innumerable  votive  offerings  hanging 
on  the  walls,  moulded  limbs,  naive  (indeed  hideous) 
124 


Montserrat. 

pictures  representing  the  dangers  from  which  the 
Virgin  had  saved  her  faithful,  httle  jackets  of 
children  who  had  been  cured  from  sickness,  great 
plaits  of  hair  which  women  had  cut  off  and  hung 
there,  in  thankfulness  for  the  saving  of  a  husband. 
And  I  went  every  evening  to  the  singing  of  the 
Salves  at  the  Ave  Maria,  ending  the  daylight  with 
that  admirable  chanting,  in  those  deep,  abstract 
voices  of  the  monks,  and  with  that  sense  of  divine 
things,  that  repose,  which  always  deepened  or 
heightened  in  me,  as  I  came  out  through  the  cloisters 
into  the  court  of  the  plane  trees,  and  looked  up  at 
the  vast,  obscure,  mysteriously  impending  heights, 
gulfing  downwards  into  unseen  depths,  with  a  kind 
of  grateful  wonder,  as  if  all  one's  dreams  had  come 
true. 

And  this  sense  of  natural  fehcity,  moved  to 
astonishment,  to  the  absoluteness  of  delight  in  being 
where  one  is,  grew  upon  me  during  those  three 
days  of  my  visit,  forming  a  new  kind  of  sentiment, 
which  I  had  never  felt  before,  and  which  modified 
itself  gently  during  the  hours  of  the  day,  from  the 
blitheness  of  the  morning  chmb,  through  the  con- 
tented acceptance  of  the  afternoon  sunshine,  to  that 
placid  but  solemn  ending.  For  once,  I  was  perfectly 
happy,  and  with  that  element  of  strangeness  in  my 
happiness  without  which  I  cannot  conceive  happiness. 

I  have  always  held  that  it  is  unwise  to  ask  of  any 
perfect  thing  duration  as  well  as  existence.  Supreme 
happiness,  if  it  could  be  continued  indefinitely, 
would  in  time,  without  losing  its  essence,  lose  its 

125 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

supremacy,  which  exists  only  by  contrast.  When  I 
have  seen  a  face,  a  landscape,  an  aspect  of  the  sky, 
pass  for  a  moment  into  a  sort  of  crisis,  in  which  it 
attained  the  perfect  expression  of  itself,  I  have 
always  turned  away  rapidly,  closing  my  eyelids  on 
the  picture,  which  I  dread  to  see  fade  or  blur  before 
me.  I  would  obtain  from  things,  as  from  people, 
only  their  best ;  and  I  hold  it  to  be  not  only  wisdom 
towards  oneself,  but  a  point  of  honour  towards  them. 
Therefore,  intending  as  I  did  to  make  a  long  stay 
in  Montserrat,  and  having  provided  myself,  in  case 
of  difficulty,  with  a  letter  to  the  Abbot,  I  left, 
without  regret,  at  the  end  of  the  traditional  three 
days,  certain  that  I  could  get  nothing  more  poignant 
in  its  happiness  than  what  those  three  days  had 
given  me,  and  that  by  leaving  at  the  moment  of 
perfection  I  was  preserving  for  myself  an  incom- 
parable memory,  which  would  always  rise  for  me, 
out  of  the  plain  of  ordinary  days,  like  the  mountain 
itself,  Monsalvat,  where  I  had  perhaps  seen  the 
Holy  Graal. 

Winter,  1898. 


126 


Cadiz. 

In  the  spring  of  1899  I  spent  five  days  at  Cadiz. 
I  was  waiting  for  a  summons  to  cross  over  to  Tangier, 
a  summons  which,  as  it  happened,  never  came,  or 
was  never  obeyed.  But  that  expectation  gave  me, 
all  the  time  I  was  there,  a  pecuHar  sensation,  a  rest- 
lessness, an  unsettled  feeling,  as  of  one  pausing  by 
the  way.  I  was  alone,  unoccupied,  I  had  one  of 
those  dark,  windowless  rooms  at  my  hotel,  opening 
inwards,  which  Spaniards  seem  to  find  quite  natural, 
but  which  it  is  not  easy  for  a  stranger  to  feel  com- 
fortable in.  I  walked  about  the  streets  all  day, 
and  along  the  Muelle  looking  down  on  the  harbour, 
and  along  the  Alameda  and  the  Parque  Genoves 
looking  down  on  the  sea,  and  along  the  rough, 
unpaved  Recinto  del  Sur,  against  which  the  sea  is 
always  tossing.  If  I  walked  long  enough  in  any 
direction  I  came  out  upon  a  great  white  wall  and  the 
sea.  I  felt  as  if  I  were  on  a  narrow  island,  waiting 
for  a  ship  to  deliver  me. 

All  Cadiz  is  tall  and  white,  built  high,  because 
there  is  only  a  neck  of  land  to  build  on,  and  the 
breath  of  the  sea  is  in  every  street.  Walking,  even 
in  the  centre  of  the  town,  one  is  conscious  of  the 
neighbourhood  of  another,  an  uncertain  and  shifting, 
element.  The  people  who  passed  me  seemed  as 
conscious  as  I  of  this  restless  friend  or  enemy  at 
their  doors.  Some  of  them  had  but  just  landed 
from  the  ships  in  the  harbour,  others  were  just 
going  out  to  sea  in  them.  Every  day  there  were 
different  people  in  the  streets;    I  had  not  time  to 

127 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

get  accustomed  to  seeing  them  before  they  were 
gone.  No  one  seemed  to  be  expected  to  stay  there 
long.  I  felt  almost  ashamed,  as  day  followed  day, 
and  I  was  still  there ;  I  felt  as  if  people  were  wonder- 
ing why  I,  too,  did  not  go  on. 

Every  town,  I  suppose,  in  every  country,  has  its 
Sunday  evening  walk,  along  a  certain  route ;  and 
the  Sunday  evening  walk  at  Cadiz  is  downward 
from  the  Plaza  de  la  Constitucion,  through  the  Calle 
del  Duque  de  Tetuan  and  a  series  of  narrow,  twisting 
streets  to  the  Plaza  de  Isabel  II.,  or  to  the  Cathedral, 
or  to  the  slanting,  queerly  shaped  market-place, 
where  the  sea-wind,  which  you  have  been  leaving 
behind  as  you  go  farther  from  the  bay,  meets  you 
again,  blowing  up  from  the  open  sea.  This  walk 
through  streets  reminded  me  of  the  winding  prom- 
enade of  the  Venetians,  from  the  Piazza  di  San 
Marco  along  the  Merceria  to  the  Rialto.  Cadiz, 
too,  like  Venice,  an  "all-but-island,"  comes  natu- 
rally to  adopt  the  same  way  of  pacing  to  and  fro 
within  its  narrow  limits.  Many  of  the  people  go 
on  walking  until  ten;  some  drop  off  into  theatres 
or  cafes.  A  circus,  when  I  was  there,  had  taken 
one  of  the  theatres ;  I  stood  by  the  entrance  to  the 
ring  among  the  jockeys,  and  heard  them  talking 
English  ;  the  sight  of  the  horses  put  all  thought  of 
the  sea  out  of  my  mind. 

On  Sunday  afternoon  every  one  walked  in  the 
park ;  the  women  wore  their  best  clothes  ;  and  I 
watched  them  pass  and  re-pass,  with  a  feeling  which 
I  was  not  used  to  feel  in  Spain.  There  was  some- 
128 


Cadiz. 

thing  modern,  fashionable,  Parisian,  in  these  toilettes, 
an  aim  at  Parisian  taste  —  a  little  extravagantly 
followed,  it  must  be  admitted.  And  these  women 
had  a  look  (what  shall  I  say  ?)  more  French  than  the 
women  I  had  seen  anywhere  else  in  Spain.  They 
had,  indeed,  the  perfect  Spanish  calmness,  but  with 
it  a  slight  self-consciousness,  almost  coquetry,  with 
less  of  the  sleepy  animal.  Is  it  merely  fancy,  or  the 
unconscious  prejudice  of  a  Latin  tradition,  which 
makes  me  think  that  the  Gaditanae  are  really,  in 
some  sense,  "improbae,"  more  than  other  Anda- 
lusian  women  ?  Perhaps  it  is  only  that  they  are 
less  absorbed  in  themselves,  more  attentive  to  those 
who  look  at  them,  winningly  aware  of  their  sex, 
as  their  eyes  show.  They  are  taller,  slighter,  and 
fairer  than  the  women  of  Seville,  their  faces  are  more 
neatly  finished,  the  nose  more  delicately  curved, 
the  eyelids  very  arched,  the  eyes  wide  open  and 
very  active.  Here  not  only  the  women  of  the 
upper  and  lower  classes,  but  of  the  middle  classes 
as  well,  have  more  than  the  usual  Spanish  piquancy 
in  their  smooth  oval  faces.  Is  there  something  in 
the  sea  itself,  or  is  it  only  the  natural  hazards  of  that 
mixture  of  races  which  a  position  by  the  sea  brings 
about  ?  Certainly  the  women  of  Cadiz  are  not  like 
other  Spanish  women. 

There  is  nothing  to  see  in  Cadiz,  only  the  white 
houses,  and  the  ships  in  the  harbour,  and  the  water 
surging  and  swinging  against  the  walls.  At  night 
I  used  to  wander  on  the  desolate  stretch  of  ground 
behind  the  Cathedral,  pushing  my  way  against  the 

129 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

wind  until  I  leaned  over  the  wall,  and  could  watch 
the  grey  waves  heaving  up  and  down  with  the  long 
roll  of  the  Atlantic.  They  were  white  at  the  edge, 
where  they  pushed  hard  at  the  wall,  and  sank  back, 
and  pushed  hard  at  it  again,  A  chill  wind  blew 
across  them,  with  a  dreary  and  melancholy  sound. 
I  Ustened  anxiously;  for  once  the  sea  gave  me  no 
pleasure.  I  wanted  to  be  on  the  other  side  of  it, 
under  the  African  sun,  with  the  friend  from  whom 
I  was  waiting  to  hear.  I  was  impatient  at  being 
still  in  Europe. 

Spring,  1899. 


130 


A  Bull   Fight  at  Valencia. 

I  HAVE  always  held  that  cruelty  has  a  deep  root  in 
human  nature,  and  is  not  that  exceptional  thing 
which,  for  the  most  part,  we  are  pleased  to  suppose 
it.  I  believe  it  has  an  unadmitted,  abominable 
attraction  for  almost  every  one;  for  many  of  us, 
under  scrupulous  disguises ;  more  simply  for 
others,  and  especially  for  people  of  certain  races; 
but  the  same  principle  is  there,  under  whatever 
manifestation,  and,  if  one  takes  one's  stand  on 
nature,  claiming  that  whatever  is  deeply  rooted 
there  has  its  own  right  to  exist,  what  of  the  natural 
rights  of  cruelty  ?  The  problem  is  troubhng  me 
at  the  moment,  for  I  was  at  a  Spanish  bull  fight 
yesterday,  the  first  I  had  ever  seen ;  and  I  saw  many 
things  there  of  a  nature  to  make  one  reflect  a  little 
on  first  principles. 

The  Plaza  de  Toros  at  Valencia  is .  the  largest 
in  Spain.  It  holds  17,000  people,  nearly  3000 
m.ore  than  those  of  Barcelona,  Seville,  and  Madrid. 
Yesterday  it  was  two-thirds  full,  and,  looking  from 
my  seat  in  the  second  row  of  boxes,  that  is,  from 
the  highest  point  of  the  house,  I  saw  an  immense 
blue  circle  filling  the  space  between  the  brown 
sand  of  the  arena  and  the  pale  blue  sky  overhead. 
The  Sol,  the  side  of  the  sun,  the  cheaper  side,  was 
opposite  to  me,  and  the  shimmer  of  blue  came 
from  the  gradas,  where  the  blue  blouses  of  the 
workmen  left  the  darker  clothes  of  their  neigh- 
bours and  the  occasional  coloured  dress  of  a  woman 
hardly  distinguishable  as  more  than  a  shght  variation 

131 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

in  a  single  tone  of  colour.  Below  me  was  the  Presi- 
dent's box,  and  halfway  round  to  the  right  the  band, 
which,  punctually  at  three,  began  to  play  a  march 
as  a  door  in  the  arena,  immediately  opposite  to  me, 
was  thrown  open,  and  the  procession  came  in  — the 
espadas  and  banderilleros  in  their  pink  and  gold, 
with  their  bright  cloaks,  walking,  the  picadores, 
pike  in  hand,  on  their  horses,  the  chulos  following. 
There  were  to  be  eight  bulls,  four  in  plaza  partida^ 
that  is,  with  a  barrier  dividing  the  arena  into  two 
halves,  and  four  in  lidia  ordinaria,  with  the  whole 
of  the  arena.  As  soon  as  the  men  were  in  their 
places  a  trumpet  was  blown,  two  doors  in  the  arena 
were  thrown  open,  and  two  bulls,  each  with  a 
rosette  on  his  neck,  galloped  in.  The  two  fights 
went  on  simultaneously,  in  the  traditional  three 
acts  —  the  Suerte  de  Picar,  when  the  picadores,  on 
horseback  and  holding  long  wooden  pikes  with  a 
short  head,  meet  the  bull ;  the  Suerte  de  Banderilleray 
when  the  banderilleros  plant  their  coloured  darts 
in  his  neck;  and  the  Suerte  de  Matar,  when  the 
espada,  with  his  sword  and  his  red  cloth,  gives 
the  death-blow.  Each  fight  lasted  about  half  an 
hour,  and  was  divided  into  its  three  acts  by  the 
sound  of  trumpets. 

The  first  act  might  be  called  the  Massacre  of 
the  Horses.  There  is  no  pretence  of  fighting, 
and  the  picador  rarely  attempts  to  save  his  horse, 
although  nothing  would  be  easier ;  on  the  contrary, 
the  horse  is  deliberately  offered  to  the  bull,  with 
the  very  considerable  chance,  of  course,  that  the 
132 


A  Bull  Fight  at  Valencia. 

picador  himself  may  be  wounded  through  his  pads, 
or  as  he  rolls  over  with  his  horse.  The  horses  are 
old  and  lean,  one  eye  is  often  bandaged,  and  if,  as 
they  often  do,  they  press  back  in  terror  against 
the  barrier,  or  become  unmanageable,  a  red-coated 
chulo  comes  forward  and  takes  the  bridle,  and 
another  follows  with  a  stick,  and  the  horse  is  led 
up  to  the  bull  and  placed  sideways  to  receive  the 
charge.  The  bull,  who  has  not  the  slightest  desire 
to  attack  the  horse,  is  finally  teased  into  irritation 
by  the  red  coats  and  by  the  pink  cloaks,  which  are 
tossed  and  flaunted  before  him ;  he  paws  the  ground, 
puts  down  his  head,  and  charges.  The  pike 
pricks  him,  and  his  horns  plunge  into  the  horse's 
belly,  or  are  caught  on  the  loose  wooden  saddle, 
or,  as  happened  once  yesterday,  scrape  the  picador's 
leg.  The  cloaks  are  flourished  again,  and  the  bull 
follows  them.  Then  the  horse,  if  he  is  still  on  his 
feet,  is  again  turned  to  the  bull.  There  is  a  great 
red  hole  in  him,  and  the  blood  drips ;  but  he  is 
dragged  and  beaten  forward.  The  bull  plunges 
at  him  a  second  time,  and  this  time  he  rolls  over 
with  his  rider,  who  scrambles  out  from  under  him, 
his  yellow  clothes  stained  with  red.  Then  one 
chulo  takes  the  bridle  and  beats  the  horse  on  the 
head,  and  another  chulo  drags  him  by  the  tail,  and, 
if  he  can,  he  staggers  to  his  feet.  He  is  literally 
falhng  to  pieces,  he  has  not  ten  minutes  to  live; 
but  the  saddle  is  thrown  on  him  again  and  the  picador 
helped  into  the  saddle.  He  makes  a  few  steps,  the 
picador  drives  his  heels  into  him,  and  then  jumps 

133 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

off  as  he  falls  for  the  last  time  and  lies  kicking  on 
the  ground,  a  torn  and  battered  and  sopping  mass. 
Then  a  chulo  goes  up  to  him,  hits  him  on  the  head 
to  see  if  he  can  be  made  to  get  up  again,  and,  finding 
it  useless,  takes  out  a  long,  gimlet-Hke  dagger, 
and  drives  it  in  behind  his  ear.  Then,  keeping 
an  eye  on  the  bull,  the  chulo  scrapes  up  the  blood 
clotted  among  the  sand  into  a  basket,  and  strews 
fresh  sand  about.  Meanwhile  another  horse  is 
being  butchered,  and  the  bull's  horns  have  turned 
crimson,  and  his  neck,  where  the  pike  has  stuck 
into  him,  begins  to  redden  in  a  thin  line  down  each 
side. 

The  trumpet  sounds  again,  and  if  one  of  the 
horses  is  still  living  he  is  led  back  to  the  stables, 
to  be  used  a  second  time.  Now  comes  what  is 
really  skill  in  the  performance,  the  planting  of  the 
banderilleras.  The  bull  has  tasted  blood,  he  is 
still  untired,  and  but  slightly  wounded.  Little 
shouts  of  dehght  went  through  the  house,  and  I 
could  not  but  join  in  the  applause,  as  Velasco  nodded 
to  the  bull  and  waved  the  banderilleras  close  to  his 
eyes,  between  his  very  horns,  and  planted  them 
full-face  before  he  leapt  sideways.  And  Velasco's 
play  with  the  cloak  :  the  whole  house  rose  to  its 
feet,  in  fear  and  admiration,  once  as  he  wiped  the 
ground  with  it,  only  its  own  length  from  the  bull, 
again  and  again  and  again,  and  then,  wrapping  it 
suddenly  about  him  with  its  white  side  outwards, 
turned  his  back  on  the  bull,  and  stood  still. 

The  trumpet  sounds  again,  and  the  espada  takes 

134 


A  Bull  Fight  at  Valencia. 

his  sword  and  his  muleta,  and  goes  out  for  the  last 
scene.  This,  which  ought  to  be,  is  not  always  the 
real  climax.  The  bull  is  often  by  this  time  tired, 
has  had  enough  of  the  sport,  leaps  at  the  barrier, 
trying  to  get  out.  He  is  tired  of  running  after 
red  rags,  and  he  brushes  them  aside  contemptuously; 
he  can  scarcely  be  got  to  show  animation  enough 
to  be  decently  killed.  But  one  bull  that  I  saw  yester- 
day was  splendidly  savage,  and  fought  almost  to 
the  last,  running  about  the  arena  with  the  sword 
between  his  shoulders,  and  that  great  red  line 
broadening  down  each  side  of  his  neck  on  the  black  — 
like  a  deep  layer  of  red  paint,  one  tricks  oneself  into 
thinking.  He  carried  two  swords  in  his  neck,  and 
still  fought ;  when  at  last  he,  too,  got  weary,  and 
he  went  and  knelt  down  before  the  door  by  which 
he  had  entered,  and  would  fight  no  more.  But 
they  went  up  to  him  from  outside  the  barrier,  and 
drew  the  swords  out  of  him ;  and  he  got  to  his  feet 
again,  and  stood  to  be  killed. 

As  the  espada  bows  and  renders  up  his  sword 
the  doors  of  the  arena  are  thrown  open,  and  there 
is  a  sound  of  bells.  Teams  of  mules,  decked  w^ith 
red  and  yellow  bows  and  rosettes  all  over  their 
heads  and  their  collars,  are  driven  in,  a  rope  is 
fastened  to  the  heads  of  the  dead  horses  and  to  the 
horns  of  the  dead  bulls,  and  they  are  dragged  out 
at  full  speed,  one  after  the  other,  each  tracing  a 
long,  curving  line  in  the  sand.  Then  the  trumpets 
are  blown,  and  the  next  fight  begins. 

I  sat  there,  in  my  box,  from  three  until  half-past 

135 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

five,  when  the  eighth  bull  was  killed  in  the  half- 
darkness.  Two  men  had  been  slightly  wounded 
and  ten  horses  killed  —  a  total  which,  for  eight 
bulls,  as  El  Taurino  said  next  day,  dice  bien  poco  en 
favor  de  los  mismos.  An  odour,  probably  of  bad 
tobacco,  which  my  imagination  insisted  on  accepting 
as  the  scent  of  blood,  came  up  into  my  nostrils, 
where  it  remained  all  that  night.  Out  of  the  open 
sky  a  bird  flew  now  and  again,  darted  hurriedly 
to  and  fro,  and  escaped  into  the  free  air.  Women 
were  sitting  around  me,  with  their  children  on  their 
knees.  When  a  horse  had  been  badly  gored,  a 
lady  sitting  next  to  me  put  up  her  opera-glasses 
to  see  it  better.  There  was  no  bravado  in  it.  It 
was  simple  interest. 

There  were  moments  when  that  blue  circle,  as 
I  turned  my  head  away  from  the  arena,  seemed  to 
swim  before  my  eyes.  But  I  quickly  turned  back 
to  the  arena  again  ;  I  hated,  sickened,  and  looked ; 
and  I  could  not  have  gone  out  until  the  last  bull 
had  been  killed.  The  bulls  were  by  no  means  a 
good  ganado ;  I  could  have  wished  them  more 
spirited.  The  odds  are  so  infinitely  in  favour  of 
the  bull-fighter;  he  can  always  count  on  the  pause 
which  the  bull  makes  between  one  rush  and  another, 
and  on  the  infallible  diversion  of  the  red  rag.  It  is 
a  game  of  agility,  presence  of  mind,  sureness  of 
foot  and  hand ;  dangerous  enough,  certainly,  but 
not  more  dangerous  than  the  daily  exercises  of  an 
equilibrist.  But  there  is  always  that  odd  chance, 
like  the  gambler's  winning  number,  which  may 
136 


A  Bull  Fight  at  Valencia. 

turn  up  —  the  chance  of  a  false  step,  a  miscalculation, 
and  the  bull's  horns  in  a  man's  body.  The  small 
probability  of  such  a  thing,  and  yet  the  possibility 
of  it ;  these,  combined,  are  two  of  the  motives 
which  bring  people  to  the  bull-light. 

Yet  I  cannot  help  thinking,  suppress  the  Suerte 
de  Picar,  and  you  suppress  the  bull-fight.  This 
is  the  one  abomination  and  the  abominable  attrac- 
tion. I  have  described  it  with  as  much  detail  as 
I  dare,  and  even  now  I  feel  that  I  have  hardly 
rendered  the  whole  horror  of  it.  Coming  away  from 
the  Plaza,  I  saw  every  horse  I  passed  in  the  street, 
as  I  had  seen  those  horses,  with  gaping  and  dripping 
sides,  rearing  back  against  the  barrier,  and  dragged 
and  beaten  up  to  the  horns  of  the  bull.  Well, 
that  red  plunge  of  horns  into  the  Hving  flesh,  that 
living  body  ripped  and  Hfted  and  rolled  to  the 
ground,  that  monstrous  visible  agony  dragging 
itself  about  the  sand  ;  and,  along  with  this,  the  rider 
rolhng  off,  indeed,  on  the  safe  side,  but,  for  the 
moment,  indistinguishable  from  his  Hving  barrier, 
and  with  only  that  barrier  between  him  and  the 
horns  —  it  is  this  that  one  holds  one's  breath  to  see, 
and  it  is  to  hold  one's  breath  that  one  goes  to  the 
bull-fight. 

The  cruelty  of  human  nature  —  what  is  it  ?  and 
how  is  it  that  it  has  struck  root  so  deep  ?  I  realise 
it  more  clearly,  and  understand  it  less  than  ever, 
since  I  have  come  from  that  novillada  at  Valencia. 

Winter,  1898. 


Alicante. 

I  REACHED  Alicante  during  this  last  stormy  night, 
seeing  something  of  the  country  we  were  passing 
through  by  Hghtning  flashes ;  and  when  I  went 
out  this  morning  the  roads  were  heaped  with  the 
mud  of  a  night's  rain.  The  sun  shone,  and  bright 
drops  of  rain  fell,  drying  as  they  fell,  under  that 
almost  tropical  heat;  and  as  I  found  myself,  sud- 
denly, a  dozen  steps  from  the  door  of  my  hotel, 
standing  under  a  palm  tree  on  a  beach  where  bare- 
footed sailors  were  dragging  up  the  boats,  with 
the  whole  shining  sea  before  me,  green  and  silver 
and  pale  grey  to  the  abrupt  edge  of  the  horizon, 
where  blue-black  clouds  rose  like  a  glittering  wall, 
I  could  have  fancied  myself  scarcely  in  Europe.  I 
Hngered  there  for  some  time,  making  the  most 
of  that  sensation  of  friendly  isolation  which  the 
sudden,  unexpected  presence  of  the  sea  always 
brings  to  me,  and  then  began  to  walk  slowly  along 
the  Paseo,  under  the  double  row  of  palm  trees, 
watching  the  ships  rocking  in  the  harbour;  one 
of  them,  no  larger  than  a  fishing  vessel,  a  Cornish 
boat,  the  Little  Mystery  of  Fowey.  I  walked  under 
the  palms  the  whole  length  of  the  harbour,  and 
stopped  when  I  came  to  the  great  mole  and  the 
further  beach,  on  which  the  waves  were  coming 
in.  No  waves  have  the  same  way  of  coming  in 
on  any  two  shores.  These  were  stealthy,  sudden, 
rising  unexpectedly  out  of  a  smooth  surface,  as  a 
snake  rises  out  of  the  grass,  and  then  gliding  forward 
with  a  rushing  subsidence.  I  walked  out  on  the 
138 


Alicante. 

mole,  and  sat  down  at  the  very  end,  where  an  old 
fisherman  was  paddling  in  his  boat  after  crabs ; 
and  then  for  the  first  time  I  saw  AHcante. 

I  saw,  across  the  blue,  swaying  water  of  the 
harbour,  an  immense,  bare,  brown  rock,  lined  with 
fortifications,  crowned  with  a  castle,  and  at  its  foot 
a  compact  mass  of  flat,  white  houses,  which  trailed 
off"  to  the  left  into  apparently  a  single  hne  along  the 
water,  white  and  blue  and  mauve  and  pink,  on  the 
other  side  of  that  double  row  of  palm  trees,  and  with 
a  surprising  eff'ect  of  elegance.  Near  the  centre, 
one  or  two  blue  domes,  towers  topped  with  blue, 
square  grey  towers,  rose  from  among  the  low  roofs ; 
two  high  banks  of  rock  continued  the  central  mass 
to  the  right,  with  gaps  between,  after  which  a  low 
curve  of  bare  rock  ended  the  bay.  Behind,  a  low 
range  of  hills,  rising  and  falling  in  peaks  and  broken 
curves,  bare  for  the  clouds  to  paint  their  colours 
on,  shut  off"  this  bright  edge  of  seashore  from  the 
world. 

I  have  been  lounging  about  the  harbour  all  day, 
merely  drinking  in  sunshine  and  sea  air,  and  as  yet 
I  know  nothing  of  Alicante.  But  to-night,  walking 
about  these  muddy  streets  in  which  the  mud  is 
hke  that  on  a  deep  country  road,  and  watching 
the  people  who  pass  to  and  fro  at  that  hour  of  five, 
when,  in  Spain,  everybody  is  in  the  street,  I  figure 
Alicante  to  myself  as  a  rough,  violent  little  place, 
still  barbarous.  And,  looking  down  from  the  high 
Plaza  de  Ramiro,  those  singular,  neat  little  cabins 
on  the  seashore,  bathing-cabins,  I  suppose,  let  for 

139 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

the  season,  and  at  other  times  Uved  in  by  the  people 
of  the  place,  might  be  huts  on  a  savage  beach,  as 
they  stand  there  under  the  palm  trees.  And  the 
clouds  are  growing  stormier  over  the  sea,  stained 
with  bright,  watery  colours,  green  and  rose,  towards 
the  sunset ;  darkness  is  coming  on ;  a  steamer 
glides  out  across  the  water,  straight  into  the  stormy 
clouds,  through  which  a  soft,  pink  hghtning  flushes 
at  intervals. 

I  am  beginning  to  know  Alicante.  All  this 
morning  I  have  been  wandering  through  the  bye- 
streets,  seeing  the  whole  life  of  the  place  as  I  pass, 
in  doorways  and  at  window^s,  and  in  houses  thrown 
wide  open  to  the  street.  I  might  almost  be  seeing 
hill-tribes  squatting  in  their  caves.  The  streets, 
rising  from  about  the  harbour,  beyond  the  one  or 
two  regular,  level  streets  with  shops,  are  planted 
as  irregularly  as  the  streets  of  Le  Puy  or  of  St. 
Ives.  Often  steps  lead  from  one  level  to  another; 
and  houses  are  of  different  heights,  thrown  together 
at  random,  a  one-storied  house  by  the  side  of  a 
three-storied  house ;  and  they  rise  or  dwindle 
upwards  and  downwards  until  they  seem  to  merge 
imperceptibly  into  the  hill  itself.  As  in  the  East, 
women  are  to  be  seen  all  day  long  going  to  the  well 
with  their  pitchers,  which  they  carry  on  their  hips, 
with  one  arm  thrown  round  them.  And  these 
women,  the  women  who  sit  at  their  doors,  sewing, 
or  making  lace,  or  knitting,  or  reading,  or  talking, 
have  in  their  faces  a  ruddy  darkness  which  I  have 
as  yet  rarely  seen  in  Spain,  the  colour  of  the  pure 
140 


Alicante, 

Moor,  every  shade  of  colour,  from  a  dead  olive  to 
a  black-brown  lit  as  by  an  inner  fire.  Sometimes 
the  black  blood  shows  in  flat  nose  and  thick  Hps, 
sometimes  in  bushy  eyebrows  meeting ;  some- 
times the  outHne  of  features  is  almost  MongoHan. 
And  there  is  not  a  hnk  in  the  chain  which  joins 
the  Moor  and  the  Spaniard,  not  a  gradation  in  the 
whole  series  of  types,  which  is  not  to  be  seen  here, 
in  these  heterogeneous  streets. 

To-night,  just  before  Vespers,  I  went  into  the 
church  of  Santa  Maria,  which  fills  one  side  of  a 
little  square,  high  up,  from  which,  as  from  a  lofty 
platform,  one  can  see  the  sea,  over  and  between 
the  houses.  It  was  quite  dark  as  I  entered,  and, 
feeling  my  way,  I  came  through  a  side  chapel  to  an 
iron  gate,  which  stood  open,  through  which  I  saw 
some  one  in  a  far  corner  with  a  lighted  candle  in 
his  hand,  and,  near  to  me,  a  long  dark  figure  moving 
mechanically,  which  I  did  not  at  first  distinguish 
as  a  man  pulling  a  bell-rope.  I  stumbled  forward 
and  looked  about  me.  At  first  it  seemed  to  me 
that  I  had  found  my  way  into  a  crypt,  with  side 
crypts  all  round.  Gradually  I  perceived  a  Gothic 
vaulting  and  the  arches  of  side  chapels,  which 
succeeded  one  another  without  division  down  the 
whole  length  of  the  church.  A  tiny  fight  twinkled 
here  and  there  from  a  suspended  lamp.  I  saw  a 
kneeling  figure  in  black ;  the  sacristan  passed  on 
the  other  side  of  the  arches  with  his  candle,  which 
he  blew  out,  and  the  church  returned  to  its  silent 
darkness. 

141 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

This  morning  the  sea  has  been  magnificently- 
joyous.  I  have  been  spending  hours  on  the  two 
branches  of  the  mole  which  closes  in  the  harbour, 
watching  its  bright  extravagances ;  and  now,  as 
afternoon  advances,  the  fishing  boats  are  coming 
home,  like  great  white  birds,  one  after  the  other, 
with  wings  hfted.  The  first  has  already  passed 
me,  entered  the  harbour.  Never  was  there  a 
harbour  so  delicate,  so  elegant,  with  its  ample 
space,  its  whiteness,  the  exquisite  lines  which  the 
bare  masts  and  yard-arms  make  against  the  palm 
trees,  which  one  sees  through  swaying  cordage 
and  between  half-reefed  sails.  Ships  here  are 
what  they  should  be,  the  humanising  part  of  the 
sea's  beauty ;  and  they  are  still  as  much  as  ever  a 
part  of  the  sea  as  they  are  lifted  on  these  moving 
tides,  inside  the  harbour,  and  along  the  quay.  At 
night  I  am  watching  them  again,  under  a  sunset 
blackening  the  West  with  darkness,  and  devour- 
ing the  darkness  with  flame.  The  whole  harbour 
burns,  and  the  masts  rise  into  the  fiery  sky,  out  of 
the  purple  water,  and  across  violet  mountains. 

And  so  day  follows  day  in  a  happy  monotony. 
I  spent  yesterday  at  Elche,  a  little  rocky  town  of 
palms,  thirteen  miles  off',  which  is  really  Africa  in 
Spain.  High  up  a  bare,  crumbling  bank,  rising 
from  the  yellow  river,  where  lines  of  stooping  women 
are  pounding  clothes,  one  sees,  looking  from  the 
bridge,  a  crowd  of  squat,  white  square  houses,  set 
one  beside  and  above  another,  like  the  dwellings 
of  savage  people,  blank  walls  with  a  few  barred  holes 
142 


Alicante. 

for  windows;  above,  a  blue-domed  church  that 
might  be  a  mosque.  Palms  overtop  the  walls, 
rise  in  the  midst  of  the  houses,  swarm  in  forests  up 
to  all  the  outskirts,  stretch  into  the  country  among 
fields  and  groves  of  trees ;  and  along  all  the  alleys 
flow  variable  streams,  arrested  and  set  in  motion 
by  an  elaborate  system  of  dykes.  Under  that  hot 
sun  in  mid-winter,  following  little  paths  between 
the  rows  of  palms,  which  ended  in  their  tuft  of 
feathers  and  their  cluster  of  yellow  dates  so  high 
above  my  head,  hearing  from  that  height  the  long, 
Hngering,  Moorish  songs  of  the  date-pickers,  perched 
there  with  ropes  about  their  waists,  the  mules  waiting 
below  with  their  panniers  for  the  burdens,  I  seemed 
far  from  even  AHcante,  really  deep  in  the  tropics, 
and  not  (as  I  forced  myself  to  reflect)  a  day's  journey 
from  Madrid. 

It  is  after  all  with  relief,  as  if  I  have  shaken 
off  some  not  quite  expUcable  oppression,  that  I 
find  myself  back  again  at  Ahcante.  How  perfectly 
restful  is  this  busy  peace  of  the  morning,  in  the  blue 
harbour,  where  sea-gulls,  white  and  black,  fly  among 
the  ships ;  and  in  the  bluer  bay,  w^here  from  moment 
to  moment  a  great  sail,  passing  close  to  land,  blots 
out  the  sunshine  which  hes  glittering  on  the  placidly 
wrinkling  water !  As  the  boats  pass,  the  men 
bending  to  their  oars  and  stooping  under  the  sail, 
I  can  see  them  taking  silver  fishes  out  of  dark  nets. 
Sails  whiten  on  the  horizon  against  a  dull  cloud, 
and  darken  against  clouds  shining  with  sunlight. 
The  long  plash  of  the  tide  coils  in  about  the  rocks 

143 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

at  my  feet.  They  are  loading  the  ships  with  a 
slow,  rhythmical  roll  of  machinery.  Across  the 
harbour  a  bell  is  tolling.  All  the  rest  is  warm 
silence. 


Spring,  1898. 


144 


A   Spanish   Music-Hail. 

I  AM  aficionado^  as  a  Spaniard  would  say,  of  music- 
halls.  They  amuse  me,  and  I  am  always  grateful 
to  any  one  or  anything  that  amuses  me.  The 
drama,  if  it  is  to  be  looked  on  as  an  art  at  all,  is 
a  serious  art,  to  be  taken  seriously ;  the  art  of  the 
music-hall  is  admittedly  frivolous  —  the  consecra- 
tion of  the  frivolous.  The  more  it  approaches  the 
legitimate  drama  the  less  characteristic,  the  less 
interesting  it  is.  Thus  what  are  called  in  England 
"sketches"  are  rarely  tolerable;  they  may  be 
endured.  If  I  want  a  farce  I  will  go  elsewhere.  I 
come  to  the  music-hall  for  dancing,  for  singing,  for 
the  human  harmonies  of  the  acrobat.  And  I  come 
for  that  exquisite  sense  of  the  frivolous,  that  air  of 
Bohemian  freedom,  that  rehef  from  respectability 
which  one  gets  here,  and  nowhere  more  surely  than 
here.  In  a  music-hall  the  audience  is  a  part  of  the 
performance.  The  audience  in  a  theatre,  besides 
being  in  itself  less  amusing,  is  on  its  best  behaviour ; 
you  do  not  so  easily  surprise  its  "humours."  Here 
we  have  a  tragic  comedy  in  the  box  yonder,  a 
farce  in  the  third  row  of  the  stalls,  a  scene  from  a 
ballet  in  the  promenade.  The  fascination  of  these 
private  performances  is  irresistible ;  and  they  are 
so  constantly  changing,  so  full  of  surprises,  so 
mysterious  and  so  clear. 

And  then  it  is  so  amusing  to  contrast  the  Pavilion 
with  the  Trocadero,  to  compare  the  Eldorado  with 
La  Scala;  to  distinguish  just  the  difference,  on  the 
stage  and  off,  which  one  is  certain  to  find  at  Collins's 

145 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  the  Metropolitan,  at  La  Cigale  and  the  Divan 
Japonais.  To  study  the  individuality  of  a  music- 
hall,  as  one  studies  a  human  individuahty,  that  is 
by  no  means  the  least  profitable,  the  least  interesting 
of  studies. 

At  the  beginning  of  last  May  I  spent  a  few  days 
at  Barcelona,  and  one  night  I  went  to  the  Alcazar 
Espafiol,  the  most  characteristic  place  I  could  find, 
extremely  curious  to  see  w^hat  a  Spanish  music- 
hall  would  be  like.  It  was  very  near  my  hotel,  in 
a  side  street  turning  out  of  the  Rambla,  and  I  had 
heard  through  the  open  window  the  sound  of  music 
and  of  voices.  I  got  there  early,  a  little  before 
nine.  The  entrance  was  not  imposing,  but  it  was 
covered  with  placards  which  had  their  interest.  I 
pushed  open  the  swing-doors  and  found  myself 
in  a  long  vestibule,  at  the  other  end  of  which  was 
a  sort  of  counter,  which  did  duty  for  a  box-ofl&ce. 
I  paid,  went  down  a  step  or  two,  and  through 
another  door.  There  was  a  bar  at  one  end  of  the 
room,  and  a  few  small  tables  placed  near  two  em- 
brasures, through  which  one  saw  an  inner  room. 
This  was  the  hall.  At  one  end  was  a  little  stage ; 
the  curtain  was  down,  and  the  musicians'  chairs 
and  desks  were  vacant.  Except  for  the  stage,  and 
for  a  gallery  which  ran  along  one  side  and  the  other 
end,  the  room  was  just  like  an  ordinary  cafe.  There 
were  the  usual  seats,  the  usual  marble-topped 
tables,  the  usual  glasses,  and,  lounging  sleepily  in 
the  corners,  the  usual  waiters.  Two  or  three  people 
stood  at  the  bar,  a  few  more  were  drinking  coffee 
146 


A  Spanish  Music-Hail. 

or  aguardiente  at  the  tables.  Presently  two  women 
came  in  and  began  to  arrange  one  another's  dresses 
in  the  corner.  Two  of  the  performers,  I  thought, 
and  rightly.  Then  a  few  more  people  came  in, 
and  a  few  more,  and  the  place  gradually  filled. 
The  audience  was  not  a  distinguished  one.  None 
of  the  women  wore  hats,  and  few  of  them  assumed 
an  air  of  too  extreme  superiority  to  the  waiters. 
Two  fantastic  creatures  at  a  table  next  to  me  seemed 
to  find  it  pleasant  as  well  as  profitable  to  be  served 
by  a  waiter  who  would  sit  down  at  the  same  table 
and  pay  open  court  to  them.  Women  would  appear 
and  disappear  at  the  door  leading  into  the  next 
room,  the  room  with  the  bar.  The  red  door  by 
the  side  of  the  stage  —  the  stage-door  —  began  to 
open  and  shut.  And  now  the  musicians  were 
assembling.  The  grey-haired  leader  of  the  or- 
chestra, smoking  a  cigar,  brought  in  the  score. 
He  sat  down  at  his  piano  and  handed  round  the 
sheets  of  music.  The  members  of  the  orchestra 
brought  newspapers  with  them.  The  man  who 
played  the  clarionet  was  smoking  a  cigarette  fixed 
in  an  interminable  holder.  He  did  his  duty  by  his 
instrument  in  the  overture  that  followed,  but  he 
never  allowed  the  cigarette  to  go  out.  I  thought 
the  performance  remarkable. 

The  band,  for  a  music-hall  of  no  higher  preten- 
sions, was  extremely  good.  It  had  the  genuine 
music-hall  swing,  and  a  sympathetic  dehcacy  which 
I  had  not  expected.  The  overture  sounded  very 
Spanish.     It   was   a   potpourri  of  some   kind,   with 

147 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

much  variety  of  airs,  a  satisfying  local  colour.  After 
the  overture  the  curtain  rose  on  a  7nise  eji  schie  of 
astonishing  meagreness.  It  was  a  zarzuela  —  a 
"sketch"  —  called  L'Ecrin  du  Shah  de  Perse,  in 
which  the  principal  performer  was  Mile.  Anna 
Durmance,  a  lady  who  spoke  excellent  French  on 
occasion,  but  who  looked  and  acted  as  only  a 
Spaniard  could  look  and  act.  The  Spaniards 
have  very  little  talent  for  acting.  They  lack 
flexibility,  they  have  not  the  instinctive  sense  of 
the  situation,  such  as  every  Frenchman  and  every 
Frenchwoman  possess  by  right  of  birth.  The 
men  move  spasmodically,  as  if  galvanised.  The 
women  place  themselves  —  gracefully,  of  course  — 
in  certain  positions,  because  they  know  that  such 
positions  are  required.  They  use  the  appropriate 
gestures,  their  faces  assume  certain  expressions ; 
but  it  is  all  done  with  the  air  of  one  who  has  learnt 
a  lesson.  And  the  lesson  has  evidently  been  a 
difficult  one.  The  zarzuela  was  amusing  in  its 
wildly  farcical  way — a  farce  of  grotesque  action, 
of  incredible  exaggeration.  There  was  a  great 
deal  of  excited  movement,  a  series  of  rather  dis- 
connected episodes,  a  good  deal  of  noise.  Anna 
Durmance  was  best  in  a  scene  where  she  came  on 
as  a  washerwoman.  Spaniards,  with  whom  the 
washerwoman's  art  is  of  public  interest,  an  element 
of  the  picturesque,  are  very  fond  of  personating 
washerwomen,  and  they  do  it  particularly  well. 
There  were  other  moments  when  Mile.  Durmance 
was  excellent ;  certain  gestures,  a  typically  Spanish 
148 


A  Spanish  Music-Hail. 

way  of  walking.  But  one  was  not  sorry  when, 
in  the  usual  sudden  way,  all  the  performers  rushed 
together  upon  the  stage ;  there  were  some  ex- 
clamations, some  laughter,  some  joining  of  hands, 
and  the  curtain  was  down  amid  a  thunder  of  applause. 
The  next  performer  was  really  a  Frenchwoman. 
"Elle  est  affreuse,"  said  a  dark  Southerner  near 
me,  whose  "meridional  vivacity"  was  unmistakably 
in  evidence,  "mais  elle  a  ete  gracieuse."  I  could 
imagine  she  had  once  been  very  handsome.  She 
was  by  no  means  "frightful"  now,  but  one  saw 
that  she  owed  something  to  her  "make-up."  Her 
voice,  as  she  sang  some  well-known  French  comic 
songs,  in  which  my  irrepressible  neighbour  joined 
from  time  to  time,  showed  signs  of  having  once 
been  better.  She  was  a  great  favourite  with  the 
audience,  and  in  the  pauses  between  the  stanzas 
she  would  smile  and  nod  to  her  friends  here  and 
there.  I  did  not  share  in  the  enthusiasm,  having 
heard  the  same  songs  much  better  given  elsewhere. 
When,  after  an  interval,  she  came  on  the  stage 
again,  dressed  as  a  man,  I  was  surprised  to  see  how 
well  she  could  look.  She  was  to  take  charge  of 
the  Teatro  Lilliputien,  and  she  made  her  bow 
before  disappearing  behind  the  curtain.  The  Lilli- 
putian Theatre  has  not,  I  think,  reached  England, 
though  it  has  long  been  at  home  in  Paris.  It  is 
a  contrivance  after  the  style  of  a  Punch  and  Judy 
show,  only,  instead  of  marionettes  who  do  all  the 
action,  there  is  a  combination  between  the  operator 
and  his  puppets.     As  in  a  certain  sort  of  caricature, 

149 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

one  sees  a  large  head  supported  by  a  tiny  body, 
with  finikin  arms  and  legs,  which  move  as  they 
are  worked  from  behind.  The  head  is  that  of  the 
performer,  the  rest  belongs  to  the  puppets ;  and 
it  is  indeed  comic  to  see  the  perfect  sympathy 
which  exists  between  the  head  which  sings,  the 
puppet  hands  which  gesticulate,  and  the  puppet 
legs  which  dance.  The  repertoire  of  these  minia- 
ture theatres  seems  to  be  limited.  The  songs  I 
heard  at  the  Alcazar  Espafiol  at  Barcelona  were 
almost  without  exception  the  same  that  I  had  heard 
at  the  Montagnes  Russes  at  Paris.  There  was  the 
same  red-haired  Englishman  who  danced  a  horn- 
pipe, the  same  "tenor  qui  monte  le  cou,"  the  same 
caricature  of  the  chorus  of  servant-girls  in  the 
Cloches  de  Corneville  —  "  Voyez  par  ci,  voyez  par  la." 
More  thunders  of  applause  —  Spanish  audiences 
are  inconceivably  enthusiastic  —  and  the  French- 
woman was  again  bowing  behind  the  footlights, 
drawing  back  rapidly  to  avoid  the  curtain  which 
came  down,  as  it  had  a  way  of  doing,  precipitately. 
After  this  we  had  some  more  music,  and  the 
curtain  rose  for  the  Baile  espaiiol  por  las  senoritas 
Espinosa.  This,  despite  its  name,  was  not  so 
typically  Spanish  as  I  had  expected.  The  two 
girls  wore  ballet-skirts,  which  are  never  used  in  the 
characteristic  Spanish  dances.  They  had  castanets, 
however,  and  there  was  something  neither  French 
nor  English  in  the  rhythm  of  their  long,  sweeping 
movements,  their  turn  backward  upon  themselves, 
their  sudden  way  of  ending  a  figure  by  a  stamp  on 

ISO 


A  Spanish  Music-Hall. 

the  ground,  followed  by  a  pose  of  unexpected 
immobility.  They  gave  us  several  dances.  Be- 
tween whiles  one  could  see  them,  in  the  very  visible 
and  haphazard  coulisses  on  the  prompt  side  of  the 
stage,  chatting  together,  signalling  to  their  friends 
in  the  audience,  giving  a  last  twitch  to  their  tights, 
a  final  pat  of  adjustment  to  the  saucer  skirts. 

As  soon  as  this  performance  was  over  I  saw 
four  of  the  women  at  the  other  end  of  the  room, 
whom  I  had  already  guessed  to  be  some  of  the 
dancers,  leave  their  places  and  make  for  the  stage- 
door.  The  next  entry  on  the  programme  was 
Baile  Sevillanas,  por  las  parejas  madre  e  hija,  Isabel 
Santos,  y  las  hermanas  Mazantini.  Isabel  Santos, 
the  mother,  was  a  vigorous,  strongly-built,  hard- 
featured,  determined-looking  woman  of  fifty.  Her 
daughter  was  slight,  graceful,  delicately  pink  and 
white,  very  pretty  and  charming ;  her  face  was 
perfectly  sweet  and  simple,  with  something  of  a 
remote  and  dreamy  look  in  the  eyes.  One  of  the 
sisters  Mazantini  was  fat,  ugly,  and  unattractive ; 
the  other,  a  rather  large  woman,  had  an  admirable 
figure  and  a  gay  and  pleasant  face.  The  curtain 
rose  to  a  strange  dance-measure.  The  four  women 
took  their  places  on  the  stage,  facing  one  another 
by  two  and  two.  They  raised  their  arms,  the  eight 
pairs  of  castanets  clanged  at  once,  and  the  dance 
began.  Spanish  dances  have  a  certain  resemblance 
with  the  dances  of  the  East.  One's  idea  of  a  dance, 
in  England,  is  something  in  which  all  the  movement 
is  due  to  the  legs.     In  Japan,  in  Egypt,  the  legs 

151 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

have  very  little  to  do  with  the  dance.  The  exquisite 
rhythms  of  Japanese  dancers  are  produced  by  the 
subtle  gesture  of  hands,  the  manipulation  of  scarves, 
the  delicate  undulations  of  the  body.  In  Arab 
dances,  in  the  danse  du  ventre,  the  legs  are  more 
motionless  still.  They  are  only  used  to  assist  in 
producing  the  extraordinary  movements  of  the 
stomach  and  the  hips  in  which  so  much  of  the  dance 
consists.  It  is  a  dance  in  which  the  body  sets  itself 
to  its  own  rhythm.  Spanish  dancing,  which  no 
doubt  derives  its  Eastern  colour  from  the  Moors, 
is  almost  equally  a  dance  of  the  whole  body,  and 
its  particular  characteristic  —  the  action  of  the  hips 
—  is  due  to  a  physical  peculiarity  of  the  Spaniards, 
whose  spines  have  a  special  and  unique  curve  of 
their  own.  The  walk  of  Spanish  women  has  a 
world-wide  fame :  one  meets  a  Venus  Callipyge 
at  every  corner ;  and  it  is  to  imitate  what  in  them 
is  real  and  beautiful  that  the  women  of  other  nations 
have  introduced  the  hideous  mimicry  of  the  "bustle." 
The  Baile  Sevillanas,  with  all  its  differences,  had  a 
very  definite  resemblance  to  the  Arab  dances  I 
had  seen.  It  began  with  a  gentle  swaying  move- 
ment in  time  to  the  regular  clack-clack  of  castanets. 
Now  the  women  faced  one  another,  now  they 
glided  to  and  fro,  changing  places,  as  in  a  move- 
ment of  the  Lancers.  The  swaying  movement 
of  the  hips  became  more  pronounced ;  the  body 
moved  in  a  sort  of  circle  upon  itself.  And  then 
they  would  cross  and  re-cross,  accentuating  the 
rhythm  with  a  stamp  of  the  heels.  Their  arms 
152 


A  Spanish  Music-Hall. 

waved  and  dipped,  curving  with  the  curves  of 
the  body.  The  dance  grew  more  exciting,  with  a 
sort  of  lascivious  suggestiveness,  a  morbid,  perverse 
charm,  as  the  women  writhed  to  and  fro,  now 
languishingly,  now  furiously,  together  and  apart. 
It  ended  with  a  frantic  tremoussement  of  the  hips, 
a  stamp  of  the  heels,  and  a  last  clang  of  the  castanets 
as  the  arms  grew  rigid  in  the  sudden  immobility 
of  the  body.  There  were  two  encores  and  two 
more  dances,  much  the  same  as  the  first,  and  then 
at  last  the  curtain  was  allowed  to  descend,  and 
the  women  went  tranquilly  back  to  the  corner 
where  they  had  been  drinking  coffee  with  their 
friends. 

When  the  curtain  rose  again,  after  a  long  in- 
terval, the  stage  was  empty  but  for  a  wooden  chair 
placed  just  in  the  middle.  The  chair  was  waiting 
for  Sefior  Pon,  who  was  to  give  us  a  concierto  de 
guitarra.  Senor  Pon,  a  business-like  person,  bustled 
on  to  the  stage,  seized  the  chair,  and  placed  it  nearer 
the  footlights,  sat  down,  looked  around  for  his 
friends  in  the  casual  and  familiar  manner  peculiar 
to  the  place,  and  began  to  tune  his  guitar.  Then 
he  plucked  softly  at  the  wires,  and  a  suave,  delicious 
melody  floated  across  the  clink  of  glasses.  One 
wanted  moonlight,  a  balcony,  a  woman  leaning 
over  the  balcony,  while  the  serenade  rose  out  of 
the  shadow.  But  indeed  one  saw  all  that.  Then 
the  melody  ceased,  and  the  business-like  Pon  was 
bowing  to  the  audience.  There  was  a  torrent  of 
applause,  and  he  sat  down  again,  and  struck  up  an 

153 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

imitative  fantasia,  in  which  one  heard  the  bugles 
blowing  the  reveille,  the  march  music  of  the  troops, 
with  clever  reahstic  effects,  and  a  really  wonderful 
command  of  the  instrument.  The  piece  ended 
suddenly,  the  musician  sprang  up,  bowed,  and 
retreated  with  his  chair,  to  avoid  the  irrepressible 
curtain.  But  the  audience  insisted  on  another 
encore,  and  when  he  had  given  it  —  a  charming 
air  played  charmingly  —  they  howled  persistently, 
but  unavaiHngly,  for  more. 

Sefior  Pon  was  followed  by  Senorita  Villaclara, 
a  fair-complexioned  woman,  with  dark,  sleepy, 
wicked  eyes,  and  black  hair  trailing  over  her  fore- 
head, with  little  curls  near  the  ears.  The  leader 
of  the  orchestra  began  to  play  on  the  piano  a  brief, 
monotonous  air,  and  the  woman  —  looking  out 
between  her  half-shut  eyes  —  began  the  Malagueiia. 
It  was  a  strange,  piercing,  Moorish  chant,  sung 
in  a  high  falsetto  voice,  in  long,  acute,  trembling 
phrases  —  a  wail  rather  than  a  song  —  with  pauses, 
as  if  to  gain  breath,  between.  A  few  words  seemed 
to  be  repeated  over  and  over  again,  with  tremulous, 
inarticulate  cries  that  wavered  in  time  to  a  regularly 
beating  rhythm.  The  sound  was  hke  nothing  I 
have  ever  heard.  It  pierced  the  brain,  it  tortured 
one  with  a  sort  of  delicious  spasm.  The  next  song 
had  more  of  a  regular  melody,  though  still  in  this 
extraordinary  strained  voice,  and  still  with  something 
of  a  lament  in  its  monotony.  I  could  not  under- 
stand the  words,  but  the  woman's  gestures  left  no 
doubt    as   to   the   character   of  the   song.     It   was 

154 


A  Spanish  Music-Hall. 

assertively  indecent,  but  with  that  curious  kind  of 
indecency  —  an  almost  religious  solemnity  in  per- 
former and  audience  —  which  the  Spaniards  share 
with  the  Eastern  races.  Another  song  followed, 
given  with  the  same  serious  and  collected  indecency, 
and  received  with  the  same  serious  and  collected 
attention.  It  had  a  refrain  of  "Alleluia!"  and  the 
woman,  I  know  not  why,  borrowed  a  man's  soft 
felt  hat,  turned  down  the  brim,  and  put  it  on  before 
beginning  the  song.  When  the  applause  was  over 
she  returned  the  hat,  came  back  to  the  table  at 
which  she  had  been  sitting,  dismally  enough,  and 
yawned  more  desperately  than  ever. 

The  dance  which  came  next  was  described  on 
the  programme  as  a  can-can.  It  was  really  more 
like  the  chahut  than  the  can-ca7i.  Four  people 
took  part,  two  men  and  two  women.  One  of  the 
men  was  as  horrible  a  creature  as  I  have  ever  seen 
—  a  huge,  clean-shaved,  close-cropped,  ashen-hued 
sort  of  human  toad ;  the  other  was  preposterously 
tall  and  thin,  all  angles.  Of  the  women,  one  was 
commonplace  enough,  with  a  seriousness  worthy 
of  Grille  d'Egout,  but  the  younger  of  the  two,  a 
piquant,  amusing  madcap,  was  as  reckless  as  La 
Goulue.  The  band  struck  up  a  lively  air  from 
Madame  Angot,  and  the  quadrille  naturaliste  began. 
It  was  very  like  the  chahut  as  one  sees  it  at  the 
MouHn  Rouge,  but  there  were  differences,  and  the 
Spanish  dance  was  certainly  the  merrier  and  the 
more  like  a  quadrille,  as  certainly  as  it  was  a  less 
elaborate    and    extraordinary    performance.     Skirts 

155 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

whirled,  legs  shot  into  the  air,  there  was  a  posturing, 
a  pirouetting,  and  then  each  man  seized  his  partner 
and  led  her  round  the  stage  at  a  gallop.  Then 
the  skirts  rose  and  twirled  again,  the  little  shoes 
waved  in  the  air,  and  the  merry-faced  woman 
laughed  as  she  flung  herself  into  the  headlong 
movement  of  the  dance.  Not  the  least  astonishing 
part  of  it  was  the  series  of  hops  by  which  the  toad- 
like man  defied  every  principle  of  equilibrium,  now 
more  than  ever  toad-like,  as  he  squatted  lumpishly 
on  his  heels.  Dance  followed  dance,  as  tune  changed 
to  tune,  and  it  was  almost  in  a  state  of  exhaustion 
that  the  quartet  finally  trailed  off"  the  stage. 

There  was  still  another  dance  to  be  given,  and 
by  the  performers  of  the  Baile  Sevillanas.  It  was 
something  between  that  and  the  can-can,  with  the 
high-kicking  of  the  latter,  and  the  swaying  move- 
ment, accentuated  by  the  heels  of  the  former.  In 
response  to  an  encore,  Isabel  Santos,  the  sturdy 
old  veteran,  came  forward  alone,  and  it  was  indeed 
half  comic,  and  soon  wholly  impressive,  to  see  this 
incredibly  agile  middle-aged  woman  go  through 
the  wild  movements  of  the  dance.  She  did  it  with 
immense  spirit,  flinging  her  legs  into  the  air  with 
a  quite  youthful  vivacity ;  she  did  it  also  with  a 
profound  artistic  seriousness,  which  soon  conquered 
one's  inclination  to  see  anything  ridiculous  or  un- 
seemly in  the  performance.  I  am  afraid  the  pretty 
daughter  will  never  be  such  a  dancer  as  the  hard- 
featured  mother.  Isabel  Santos  the  elder  is,  in 
her  way,  a  great  artist. 
156 


A  Spanish  Music-Hall. 

After  this  —  it  was  now  past  midnight  —  there 
was  nothing  specially  new  or  interesting  in  the  few 
numbers  that  a  too  Hberal  management  wasted  on 
the  few  drinkers  who  still  sat  about  the  hall.  The 
Proven9al  near  me  had  gone,  in  his  turbulent  way; 
the  two  women  at  the  next  table  were  gathering 
up  their  shawls ;  nearly  all  the  glasses  were  empty, 
and  no  one  clapped  his  hands  for  the  waiter  with 
the  two  kettles,  the  coffee  and  the  milk.  One  by 
one  the  dancers  left  their  corner  and  made  for  the 
door;  and  when,  at  last,  Isabel  Santos  and  her 
pretty  daughter  had  said  good-bye,  I  saw  there 
was  nothing  to  stay  for,  and  I  followed. 

1892. 


157 


II. 

London :   A  Book  of 
Aspects. 


I. 

There  is  in  the  aspect  of  London  a  certain  magnifi- 
cence :  the  magnificence  of  weight,  sohdity,  energy, 
imperturbabihty,  and  an  unconquered  continuance. 
It  is  ahve  from  border  to  border,  not  an  inch  of  it 
is  not  ahve.  It  exists,  goes  on,  and  has  been 
going  on  for  so  many  centuries.  Here  and  there 
a  stone  or  the  Hne  of  a  causeway  fixes  a  date.  If 
you  look  beyond  it  you  look  into  fog.  It  sums 
up  and  includes  England.  Materially  England  is 
contained  in  it,  and  the  soul  of  England  has  always 
inhabited  it  as  a  body.  We  have  not  had  a  great 
man  who  has  never  lived  in  London. 

And  London  makes  no  display;  it  is  there, 
as  it  has  come,  as  fire  and  plagues  have  left  it ;  but 
it  has  never  had  either  a  Haussmann  or  a  Nero. 
It  has  none  of  the  straight  lines  of  Paris  nor  the 
tall  lines  of  Vienna  nor  the  emphatic  German 
monotony.  It  has  not  the  natural  aids  of  Con- 
stantinople, with  seas  and  continents  about  it,  nor 
of  Rome,  with  its  seven  hills,  and  its  traces  of  all 
the  history  of  the  world.  It  was  set  in  fertile  soil, 
which  has  still  left  it  the  marvellous  green  grass  of 
its  parks,  and  on  a  river  which  has  brought  beauty 
along  its  whole  course.  Great  architects  have  left 
a  few  unspoilt  treasures :  Westminster  Abbey, 
the  Banqueting  Hall  at  Whitehall,  an  old  church 
here  and  there.  But  for  the  most  part  the  appeal 
of  London  is  made  by  no  beauty  or  effect  in  things 
themselves,  but  by  the  sense  which  it  gives  us  of 
inevitable   growth    and    impregnable    strength,    and 

i6i 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

by  the  atmosphere  which  makes  and  unmakes  this 
vast  and  soHd  city  every  morning  and  every  evening 
with  a  natural  magic  pecuhar  to  it. 

Enghsh  air,  working  upon  London  smoke, 
creates  the  real  London.  The  real  London  is  not 
a  city  of  uniform  brightness,  hke  Paris,  nor  of 
savage  gloom,  like  Prague;  it  is  a  picture  con- 
tinually changing,  a  continual  sequence  of  pictures, 
and  there  is  no  knowing  what  mean  street  corner 
may  not  suddenly  take  on  a  glory  not  its  own. 
The  English  mist  is  always  at  work  like  a  subtle 
painter,  and  London  is  a  vast  canvas  prepared  for 
the  mist  to  work  on.  The  especial  beauty  of 
London  is  the  Thames,  and  the  Thames  is  so 
wonderful  because  the  mist  is  always  changing  its 
shapes  and  colours,  always  making  its  light  mysteri- 
ous, and  building  palaces  of  cloud  out  of  mere 
Parliament  Houses  with  their  jags  and  turrets. 
When  the  mist  collaborates  with  night  and  rain, 
the  masterpiece  is  created. 

Most  travellers  come  into  London  across  the 
river,  sometimes  crossing  it  twice.  The  entrance, 
as  you  leave  the  country  behind  you,  is  ominous. 
If  you  come  by  night,  and  it  is  never  wise  to  enter 
any  city  except  by  night,  you  are  slowly  swallowed 
up  by  a  blank  of  blackness,  pierced  by  holes  and 
windows  of  dingy  light;  foul  and  misty  eyes  of 
light  in  the  sky;  narrow  gulfs,  in  which  lights 
blink;  blocks  and  spikes  of  black  against  grey; 
masts,  as  it  were,  rising  out  of  a  sea  of  mist ;  then 
a  whole  street  suddenly  laid  bare  in  bright  light; 
162 


London. 

shoulders  of  dark  buildings ;  and  then  black  shiny 
rails,  and  then  the  river,  a  vast  smudge,  dismal 
and  tragic ;  and,  as  one  crosses  it  again,  between 
the  vast  network  of  the  bridge's  bars,  the  impossible 
fairy  peep-show  of  the  Embankment. 

All  this  one  sees  in  passing,  in  hardly  more 
than  a  series  of  flashes ;  but  if  you  would  see 
London  steadily  from  the  point  where  its  aspect 
is  finest,  go  on  a  night  when  there  has  been  rain  to 
the  footpath  which  crosses  Hungerford  Bridge  by 
the  side  of  the  railway-track.  The  river  seems  to 
have  suddenly  become  a  lake;  under  the  black 
arches  of  Waterloo  Bridge  there  are  reflections  of 
golden  fire,  multiplying  arch  beyond  arch,  in  a 
lovely  tangle.  The  Surrey  side  is  dark,  with  tall 
vague  buildings  rising  out  of  the  mud  on  which 
a  little  water  crawls  :  is  it  the  water  that  moves 
or  the  shadows  ?  A  few  empty  barges  or  steamers 
He  in  solid  patches  on  the  water  near  the  bank; 
and  a  stationary  sky-sign,  hideous  where  it  defaces 
the  night,  turns  in  the  water  to  wavering  bars  of 
rosy  orange.  The  buildings  on  the  Embankment 
rise  up,  walls  of  soft  greyness  with  squares  of 
Hghted  windows,  which  make  patterns  across  them. 
They  tremble  in  the  mist,  their  shapes  flicker;  it 
seems  as  if  a  breath  would  blow  out  their  Hghts  and 
leave  them  bodiless  husks  in  the  wind.  From 
one  of  the  tallest  chimneys  a  reddish  smoke  floats 
and  twists  hke  a  flag.  Below,  the  Embankment 
curves  towards  Cleopatra's  Needle :  you  see  the 
curve  of  the  wall,  as  the  lamps  Hght  it,  leaving  the 

163 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

obelisk  in  shadow,  and  falling  faintly  on  the  grey 
mud  in  the  river.  Just  that  corner  has  a  mysterious 
air,  as  if  secluded,  in  the  heart  of  a  pageant;  I 
know  not  what  makes  it  quite  so  tragic  and  melan- 
choly. The  aspect  of  the  night,  the  aspect  of 
London,  pricked  out  in  points  of  fire  against  an 
enveloping  darkness,  is  as  beautiful  as  any  sunset 
or  any  mountain ;  I  do  not  know  any  more  beautiful 
aspect.  And  here,  as  always  in  London,  it  is  the 
atmosphere  that  makes  the  picture,  an  atmosphere 
like  Turner,  revealing  every  form  through  the 
ecstasy  of  its  colour. 

It  is  not  only  on  the  river  that  London  can 
make  absolute  beauty  out  of  the  material  which 
lies  so  casually  about  in  its  streets.  A  London 
sunset,  seen  through  vistas  of  narrow  streets,  has 
a  colour  of  smoky  rose  which  can  be  seen  in  no 
other  city,  and  it  weaves  strange  splendours,  often 
enough,  on  its  edges  and  gulfs  of  sky,  not  less 
marvellous  than  Venice  can  lift  over  the  Giudecca, 
or  Siena  see  stretched  beyond  its  walls.  At  such 
a  point  as  the  Marble  Arch  you  may  see  con- 
flagrations of  jewels,  a  sky  of  burning  lavender, 
tossed  abroad  like  a  crumpled  cloak,  with  broad 
bands  of  dull  purple  and  smoky  pink,  slashed  with 
bright  gold  and  decked  with  grey  streamers ;  you 
see  it  through  a  veil  of  moving  mist,  which  darkens 
downwards  to  a  solid  block,  coloured  like  lead, 
where  the  lighted  road  turns,  meeting  the  sky. 

And  there  are  a  few  open  spaces,  which  at  all 
times  and  under  all  lights  are  satisfying  to  the 
164 


London. 

eyes.  Hyde  Park  Corner,  for  no  reason  in  par- 
ticular, gives  one  the  first  sensation  of  pleasure  as 
one  comes  into  London  from  Victoria  Station. 
The  glimpse  of  the  two  parks,  with  their  big  gates, 
the  eager  flow  of  traffic,  not  too  tangled  or  laborious 
just  there,  the  beginning  of  Piccadilly,  the  lack  of 
stiff"ness  in  anything :  is  it  these  that  help  to  make 
up  the  impression  ?  Piccadilly  Circus  is  always 
like  a  queer  hive,  and  is  at  least  never  dead  or 
formal.  But  it  is  Trafalgar  Square  which  is  the 
conscious  heart  or  centre  of  London. 

If  the  Thames  is  the  soul  of  London,  and  if 
the  parks  are  its  eyes,  surely  Trafalgar  Square 
may  well  be  reckoned  its  heart.  There  is  no  hour 
of  day  or  night  when  it  is  not  admirable,  but  for 
my  part  I  prefer  the  evening,  just  as  it  grows  dusk, 
after  a  day  of  heavy  rain.  How  often  have  I  walked 
up  and  down,  for  mere  pleasure,  for  a  pleasure 
which  quickened  into  actual  excitement,  on  that 
broad,  curved  platform  from  which  you  can  turn 
to  look  up  at  the  National  Gallery,  like  a  frontispiece, 
and  from  which  you  can  look  down  over  the  dark 
stone  pavement,  black  and  shining  with  rain,  on 
which  the  curved  fountains  stand  with  their  inky 
water,  while  two  gas-lamps  cast  a  feeble  light  on 
the  granite  base  of  the  Nelson  monument  and  on 
the  vast  sulky  lions  at  the  corners.  The  pedestal 
goes  up  straight  into  the  sky,  diminishing  the 
roofs,  which  curve  downwards  to  the  white  clock- 
face,  alone  visible  on  the  clock-tower  at  West- 
minster.    Whitehall    flows    like    a    river,    on   which 

165 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

vague  shapes  of  traffic  float  and  are  submerged. 
The  mist  and  the  twihght  hide  the  one  harmonious 
building  in  London,  the  Banqueting  Hall.  You 
reaUse  that  it  is  there,  and  that  beyond  it  are  the 
Abbey  and  the  river,  with  the  few  demure  squares 
and  narrow  frugal  streets  still  left  standing  in 
Westminster. 

It  is  only  after  trying  to  prefer  the  parks  and 
public  gardens  of  most  of  the  other  capitals  of 
Europe  that  I  have  come  to  convince  myself  that 
London  can  more  than  hold  its  own  against  them 
all.  We  have  no  site  comparable  with  the  site 
of  the  Pincio  in  Rome,  none  of  the  opalescent  water 
which  encircles  the  gardens  at  Venice,  no  Sierras 
to  see  from  our  Prado,  not  even  a  Berlin  forest  in 
the  midst  of  the  city;  and  I  for  one  have  never 
loved  a  London  park  as  I  have  loved  the  Luxem- 
bourg Gardens  ;  but,  if  we  will  be  frank  with  our- 
selves, and  put  sentiment  or  the  prejudice  of  foreign 
travel  out  of  our  heads,  we  shall  have  to  admit 
that  in  the  natural  properties  of  the  park,  in  grass, 
trees,  and  the  magic  of  atmosphere,  London  is  not 
to  be  excelled. 

And,  above  all,  in  freshness.  After  the  London 
parks  all  others  seem  dusty  and  dingy.  It  is  the 
English  rain,  and  not  the  care  of  our  park-keepers, 
that  brings  this  gloss  out  of  the  grass  and  gives 
our  public  gardens  their  air  of  country  freedom. 
Near  the  Round  Pond  you  might  be  anywhere 
except  in  the  middle  of  a  city  of  smoke  and  noise, 
and  it  is  only  by  an  unusually  high  roof  or  chimney, 
i66 


London. 

somewhere  against  the  sky,  far  off,  that  you  can 
reahse  where  you  are.  The  Serpentine  will  never 
be  vulgarised,  though  cockneys  paddle  on  it  in 
boats;  the  water  in  St.  James's  Park  will  always 
be  kept  wild  and  strange  by  the  sea-gulls ;  and  the 
toy-boats  only  give  an  infantile  charm  to  the  steel- 
blue  water  of  the  Round  Pond.  You  can  go 
astray  in  long  avenues  of  trees,  where,  in  autumn, 
there  are  always  children  playing  among  the  leaves, 
building  tombs  and  castles  with  them.  In  summer 
you  can  sit  for  a  whole  afternoon,  undisturbed, 
on  a  chair  on  that  green  slope  which  goes  down 
to  the  artificial  end  of  the  Serpentine,  where  the 
stone  parapets  are,  over  the  water  from  the  peacocks. 
It  is  only  the  parks  that  make  summer  in  London 
almost  bearable. 

I  have  never  been  able  to  love  Regent's  Park, 
though  I  know  it  better  than  the  others,  and  though 
it  has  lovely  water-birds  about  its  islands,  and 
though  it  is  on  the  way  to  the  Zoological  Gardens. 
Its  flowers  are  the  best  in  London,  for  colour, 
form,  and  tending.  You  hear  the  wild  beasts, 
but  no  city  noises.  Those  sounds  of  roaring, 
crying,  and  the  voices  of  imprisoned  birds  are 
sometimes  distressing,  and  are  perhaps  one  of  the 
reasons  why  one  can  never  be  quite  happy  or  aloof 
from  things  in  Regent's  Park.  The  water  there 
is  meagre,  and  the  boats  too  closely  visible ;  the 
children  are  poorer  and  seem  more  preoccupied 
than  the  children  in  the  western  parks.  And 
there    is    the    perplexing    inner    circle,    which    is    as 

167 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

difficult  to  get  in  or  out  of  as  its  lamentable  name- 
sake underground.  Coming  where  it  does,  the 
park  is  a  breathing-place,  an  immense  relief;  but 
it  is  the  streets  around,  and  especially  the  Mary- 
lebone  Road,  that  give  it  its  value. 

There  remains  what  is  more  than  a  park,  but 
in  its  way  worth  them  all :  Hampstead  Heath. 
There  are  to  be  trains  to  bring  poor  people  from 
the  other  end  of  London,  philanthropic  trains, 
but  the  heath  will  be  spoilt,  and  it  is  almost  the  last 
thing  left  to  spoil  in  London.  Up  to  now,  all  the 
Saturday  afternoons,  the  Sundays,  the  Bank  Holi- 
days, have  hardly  touched  it.  There  are  hiding- 
places,  even  on  these  evil  days,  and  if  one  fails  there 
is  always  another.  And  if  one  has  the  good  fortune 
to  live  near  it,  and  can  come  out  in  the  middle  of 
the  night  upon  Judges'  Walk,  when  the  moonlight 
fills  the  hollow  like  a  deep  bowl,  and  silence  is  like 
that  peace  which  passeth  understanding,  everything 
else  in  London  will  seem  trivial,  a  mere  individual 
thing,  compared  with  it. 

On  the  heath  you  are  lifted  over  London,  but 
you  are  in  London.  It  is  that  double  sense,  that 
nearness  and  remoteness  combined,  the  sight  of 
St.  Paul's  from  above  the  level  of  the  dome,  the 
houses  about  the  pond  in  the  Vale  of  Health,  from 
which  one  gets  so  unparalleled  a  sensation.  But 
the  heath  is  to  be  loved  for  its  own  sake,  for  its 
peace,  amplitude,  high  bright  air  and  refreshment ; 
for  its  mystery,  wildness,  formality ;  for  its  grassy 
pools  and  hillocks  that  flow  and  return  like  waves 
i68 


London. 

of  the  sea ;  for  its  green  grass  and  the  white  roads 
chequering  it ;  for  its  bracken,  its  mist  and  bloom 
of  trees.  Every  knoll  and  curve  of  it  draws  the 
feet  to  feel  their  soft  shapes ;  one  cannot  walk,  but 
must  run  and  leap  on  Hampstead  Heath. 


169 


11. 


As  you  come  back  into  London  from  the  country, 
out  of  air  into  smoke,  rattling  level  with  the  chimney- 
pots, and  looking  down  into  narrow  gulfs  swarming 
with  men  and  machines,  you  are  as  if  seized  in  a 
gigantic  grip.  First  comes  a  splendid  but  dis- 
heartening sense  of  force,  forcing  you  to  admire 
it,  then  a  desperate  sense  of  helplessness.  London 
seems  a  vast  ant-heap,  and  you  are  one  more  ant 
dropped  on  the  heap.  You  are  stunned,  and 
then  you  come  to  yourself,  and  your  thought  revolts 
against  the  material  weight  which  is  crushing  you. 
What  a  huge  futility  it  all  seems,  this  human  ant- 
heap,  this  crawling  and  hurrying  and  sweating 
and  building  and  bearing  burdens,  and  never  rest- 
ing all  day  long  and  never  bringing  any  labour 
to  an  end.  After  the  fields  and  the  sky  London 
seems  trivial,  a  thing  artificially  made,  in  which 
people  work  at  senseless  toils,  for  idle  and  imaginary 
ends.  Labour  in  the  fields  is  regular,  sane,  in- 
evitable as  the  labour  of  the  earth  with  its  roots. 
You  are  in  your  place  in  the  world,  between  the 
grass  and  the  clouds,  really  alive  and  living  as  na- 
turala  life  as  the  beasts.  In  London  men  work  as  if 
in  darkness,  scarcely  seeing  their  own  hands  as 
they  work,  and  not  knowing  the  meaning  of  their 
labour.  They  wither  and  dwindle,  forgetting  or 
not  knowing  that  it  was  ever  a  pleasant  thing  merely 
to  be  alive  and  in  the  air.  They  are  all  doing 
things  for  other  people,  making  useless  "improve- 
ments," always  perfecting  the  achievement  of 
170 


London. 

material  results  with  newly  made  tools.  They 
are  making  things  cheaper,  more  immediate  in 
effect,  of  the  latest  modern  make.  It  is  all  a  hurry, 
a  levelling  downward,  an  automobilisation  of  the 
mind. 

And  their  pleasures  are  as  their  labours.  In 
the  country  you  have  but  to  walk  or  look  out  of 
your  window  and  you  are  in  the  midst  of  beautiful 
and  living  things :  a  tree,  a  dimly  jewelled  frog, 
a  bird  in  flight.  Every  natural  pleasure  is  about 
you  :  you  may  walk,  or  ride,  or  skate,  or  swim,  or 
merely  sit  still  and  be  at  rest.  But  in  London  you 
must  invent  pleasures  and  then  toil  after  them. 
The  pleasures  of  London  are  more  exhausting  than 
its  toils.  No  stone-breaker  on  the  roads  works 
so  hard  or  martyrs  his  flesh  so  cruelly  as  the  actress 
or  the  woman  of  fashion.  No  one  in  London 
does  what  he  wants  to  do,  or  goes  where  he  wants 
to  go.  It  is  a  suffering  to  go  to  any  theatre,  any 
concert.  There  are  even  people  who  go  to  lectures. 
And  all  this  continual  self-sacrifice  is  done  for 
"amusement."     It  is  astonishing. 

London  was  once  habitable,  in  spite  of  itself. 
The  machines  have  killed  it.  The  old,  habitable 
London  exists  no  longer.  Charles  Lamb  could 
not  Hve  in  this  mechanical  city,  out  of  which  every- 
thing old  and  human  has  been  driven  by  wheels 
and  hammers  and  the  fluids  of  noise  and  speed. 
When  will  his  affectionate  phrase,  "the  sweet 
security  of  streets,"  ever  be  used  again  of  London  ? 
No  one  will  take  a  walk  down  Fleet  Street  any  more, 

171 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

no  one  will  shed  tears  of  joy  in  the  "motley  Strand," 
no  one  will  be  leisurable  any  more,  or  turn  over 
old  books  at  a  stall,  or  talk  with  friends  at  the  street 
corner.  Noise  and  evil  smells  have  filled  the  streets 
like  tunnels  in  dayhght ;  it  is  a  pain  to  walk  in  the 
midst  of  all  these  hurrying  and  clattering  machines ; 
the  multitude  of  humanity,  that  "bath"  into 
which  Baudelaire  loved  to  plunge,  is  scarcely  dis- 
cernible, it  is  secondary  to  the  machines ;  it  is  only 
in  a  machine  that  you  can  escape  the  machines. 
London  that  was  vast  and  smoky  and  loud, 
now  stinks  and  reverberates ;  to  live  in  it  is  to 
live  in  the  hollow  of  a  clanging  bell,  to  breathe  its 
air  is  to  breathe  the  foulness  of  modern  progress. 

London  as  it  is  now  is  the  wreck  and  moral  of 
civilisation.  We  are  more  civilised  every  day, 
every  day  we  can  go  more  quickly  and  more  un- 
comfortably wherever  we  want  to  go,  we  can  have 
whatever  we  want  brought  to  us  more  quickly 
and  more  expensively.  We  live  by  touching 
buttons  and  ringing  bells,  a  new  purely  practical 
magic  sets  us  in  communication  with  the  ends  of 
the  earth.  We  can  have  abominable  mockeries 
of  the  arts  of  music  and  of  speech  whizzing  in  our 
ears  out  of  metal  mouths.  We  have  outdone  the 
wildest  prophetic  buffooneries  of  Villiers  de  I'lsle 
Adam,  whose  "celestial  bill-sticking"  may  be 
seen  nightly  defacing  the  majesty  of  the  river ; 
here  any  gramophones  can  give  us  the  equivalent 
of  his  "chemical  analysis  of  the  last  breath."  The 
plausible  and  insidious  telephone  aids  us  and 
172 


London. 

intrudes  upon  us,  taking  away  our  liberty  from  us, 
and  leaving  every  Englishman's  house  his  castle 
no  longer,  but  a  kind  of  whispering  gallery,  open 
to  the  hum  of  every  voice.  There  is  hardly  a  street 
left  in  London  where  one  can  talk  with  open  win- 
dovv'S  by  day  and  sleep  with  open  windows  by  night. 
We  are  tunnelled  under  until  our  houses  rock, 
we  are  shot  through  holes  in  the  earth  if  we  want 
to  cross  London;  even  the  last  Hberty  of  Hamp- 
stead  Heath  is  about  to  be  taken  from  us  by  railway. 
London  has  civilised  itself  into  the  likeness  of  a 
steam  roundabout  at  a  fair;  it  goes  clattering 
and  turning,  to  the  sound  of  a  jubilant  hurdy- 
gurdy  ;  round  and  round,  always  on  the  same 
track,  but  always  faster;  and  the  children  astride 
its  wooden  horses  think  they  are  getting  to  the 
world's  end. 

It  is  the  machines,  more  than  anything  else, 
that  have  done  it.  Men  and  women,  as  they 
passed  each  other  in  the  street  or  on  the  road,  saw 
and  took  cognisance  of  each  other,  human  being 
of  human  being.  The  creatures  that  we  see  now 
in  the  machines  are  hardly  to  be  called  human 
beings,  so  are  they  disfigured  out  of  all  recognition, 
in  order  that  they  may  go  fast  enough  not  to  see 
an3rthing  themselves.  Does  any  one  any  longer 
walk  ?  If  I  walk  I  meet  no  one  walking,  and  I 
cannot  wonder  at  it,  for  what  I  meet  is  an  uproar, 
and  a  whizz,  and  a  leap  past  me,  and  a  blinding 
cloud  of  dust,  and  a  machine  on  which  scarecrows 
perch  is  disappearing  at  the  end  of  the  road.     The 

173 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

verbs  to  loll,  to  lounge,  to  dawdle,  to  loiter,  the 
verbs  precious  to  Walt  Whitman,  precious  to  every 
lover  of  men  and  of  himself,  are  losing  their  currency ; 
they  will  be  marked  "o"  for  obsolete  in  the  diction- 
aries of  the  future.  All  that  poetry  which  Walt 
Whitman  found  in  things  merely  because  they 
were  alive  will  fade  out  of  existence  like  the  Red 
Indian.  It  will  live  on  for  some  time  yet  in  the 
country  where  the  railway  has  not  yet  smeared  its 
poisonous  trail  over  the  soil ;  but  in  London  there 
will  soon  be  no  need  of  men,  there  will  be  nothing 
but  machines. 

There  was  a  time  when  it  was  enough  merely 
to  be  alive,  and  to  be  in  London.  Every  morning 
promised  an  adventure ;  something  or  some  one 
might  be  waiting  at  the  corner  of  the  next  street ; 
it  was  difficult  to  stay  indoors  because  there  were 
so  many  people  in  the  streets.  I  still  think,  after 
seeing  most  of  the  capitals  of  Europe,  that  there  is 
no  capital  in  Europe  where  so  many  beautiful 
women  are  to  be  seen  as  in  London.  Warsaw 
comes  near,  for  rarity ;  not  for  number.  The 
streets  and  the  omnibuses  were  always  alive  with 
beauty  or  with  something  strange.  In  London 
anything  may  happen.  "Adventures  to  the  ad- 
venturous ! "  says  somebody  m  Contarini  Fleming. 
But  who  can  look  as  high  as  the  uneasy  faces 
on  a  motor-omnibus,  who  can  look  under  the 
hoods  and  goggles  in  a  motor-car }  The  roads 
are  too  noisy  now  for  any  charm  of  expression  to 
be     seen     on     the     pavements.     The     women     are 

174 


London. 

shouting  to  each  other,  straining  their  ears  to  hear. 
They  want  to  get  their  shopping  done  and  to  get 
into  a  motor-car  or  a  motor-omnibus. 

Could    another    Charles    Lamb    create    a    new 
London  ? 


175 


III. 

How  much   of  Lamb's   London   is   left?     "London 
itself  a  pantomime  and  a  masquerade"  is  left,  and 
"a  mind  that  loves  to  find  itself  at  home  in  crowds" 
is   never  without   those   streets   and   pavements   to 
turn  by  its  alchemy  into  pure  gold.     "Is  any  night- 
walk  comparable,"  as  he  asks,  and  need  not  have 
waited  for  an  answer,  "to  a  walk  from  St.   Paul's 
to  Charing  Cross,  for  lighting  and  paving,  crowds 
going    and    coming   without    respite,    the    rattle    of 
coaches     and     the    cheerfulness    of    shops?"     "St. 
Paul's     Churchyard!"      he     cries,      "the     Strand! 
Exeter    Change !     Charing    Cross,    with    the    man 
upon    the    black    horse!     These    are    thy    gods,    O 
London!"     One   has   to  turn  to  the   notes  on   the 
letters  to  find  out  that  Exeter  Change  was  "a  great 
building,   with    bookstalls    and   miscellaneous   stalls 
on  the  ground  floor  and  a  menagerie  above."     How 
dehcious    that    sounds!     But    then    "it    was    de- 
mohshed    in    1829."     Temple    Bar    has    gone,    and 
the  griffin,  which  would  have  seemed  to  Lamb  as 
permanent    as    London    Stone.     Staple    Inn    would 
have   been   less   of  an   anomaly   to   him   in   "noble 
Holborn"  than  it  is  to  us,  as  it  stands,  with  an  aged 
helplessness,  not  far  oflF  from  the  useful  horrors  of 
Holborn  Viaduct,  a  "modern  improvement"  which 
has  swept  away  the  old  timbered  houses  that  used 
to  make  an  island  in  the  middle  of  the  street.     Like 
all  old  London,  that  is  not  hidden  away  in  a  corner 
(as  St.  John's  Gateway  is,  on  its  hill  at  the  back  of 
Smithfield,   and   St.   Bartholomew's   Church,  which 
176 


London. 

hinders  nobody's  passing,  and  the  Charterhouse, 
which  has  so  far  held  its  own),  they  have  had  to 
make  way  for  the  traffic,  that  traffic  which  is  steadily 
pushing  down  the  good  things  that  are  old  and 
shouldering  up  the  bad  new  things  that  will  be 
temporary.  We  have  still,  and  for  historic  and 
royal  reasons  will  always  have,  Westminster  Abbey : 
the  Beautiful  Temple,  as  Lamb  called  it,  when  he 
was  religiously  occupied  in  "shaming  the  sellers 
out  of  the  Temple."  A  church  that  is  not  in  the 
way  of  a  new  street,  or  does  not  intrude  over  the 
edge  of  a  new  widening,  is,  for  the  most  part,  safe. 
But  we,  who  live  now,  have  seen  Christ's  Hospital, 
that  comely  home  and  fosterer  of  genius,  pulled 
down,  stone  by  stone,  its  beautiful  memory  obhter- 
ated,  because  boys,  they  say,  want  country  air. 
That  was  one  of  the  breathing-places,  the  old  quiet 
things,  that  helped  to  make  the  city  habitable. 
Newgate  has  been  pulled  down,  and  with  Newgate 
goes  some  of  the  strength  and  permanence  of 
London.  There  was  a  horrible  beauty  in  those 
impregnable  grey  stone  walls,  by  the  side  of  the 
city  pavement.  The  traffic  has  fallen  upon  them 
Uke  a  sea,  and  they  have  melted  away  before  it. 

Lamb  saw  London  changing,  and  to  the  end 
he  said,  "London  streets  and  faces  cheer  me  in- 
expressibly, though  of  the  latter  not  one  known 
one  were  remaining."  But  to  his  sister  it  seemed 
that  he  "found  it  melancholy,"  "the  very  streets," 
he  says,  "altering  every  day."  Covent  Garden, 
where  he  lived,  has  lasted ;    the  house  he  lived  in 

177 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

still  stands  looking  into  Bow  Street.  And  the 
Temple,  that  lucky  corner  of  the  City  which  is 
outside  city  jurisdiction,  has  been  Httle  spoiled 
by  time,  or  the  worse  improvements  of  restorers. 
But  I  ask  myself  what  Lamb  would  have  said  if  he 
had  hved  to  see  tram-hnes  sliming  the  bank  of  the 
river,  and  the  trees  amputated  to  preserve  the  hats 
of  living  creatures,  in  what  way  better  or  more 
woitby  of  attention  than  those  trees  .? 

I  When  I  see  London  best  is  when  I  have  been 
abroad  for  a  long  time.  Then,  as  I  sit  on  the  top 
of  an  omnibus,  coming  in  from  the  Marble  Arch, 
that  long  line  of  Oxford  Street  seems  a  surprising 
and  delightful  thing,  full  of  picturesque  irregulari- 
ties, and  Piccadilly  Circus  seems  incredibly  alive 
and  central,  and  the  Strand  is  glutted  with  a  traffic 
typically  English^  I  am  able  to  remember  how 
I  used  to  turn  out  of  the  Temple  and  walk  slowly 
towards  Charing  Cross,  elbowing  my  way  medita- 
tively, making  up  sonnets  in  my  head  while  I 
missed  no  attractive  face  on  the  pavement  or  on 
the  top  of  an  omnibus,  pleasantly  conscious  of  the 
shops  yet  undistracted  by  them,  happy  because  I 
was  in  the  midst  of  people,  and  happier  still  because 
they  were  all  unknown  to  me.  For  years  that  was 
my  feeling  about  London,  and  now  I  am  always 
grateful  to  a  foreign  absence  which  can  put  me 
back,  if  only  for  a  day,  into  that  comfortable  frame 
of  mind.  Baudelaire's  phrase,  "a  bath  of  multi- 
tude," seemed  to  have  been  made  for  me,  and  I 
suppose  for  five  years  or  so,  all  the  first  part  of 
178 


London. 

the  time  when  I  was  Hving  in  the  Temple,  I  never 
stayed  indoors  for  the  whole  of  a  single  evening. 
There  were  times  when  I  went  out  as  regularly  as 
clockwork  every  night  on  the  stroke  of  eleven. 
No  sensation  in  London  is  so  familiar  to  me  as  that 
emptiness  of  the  Strand  just  before  the  people 
come  out  of  the  theatres,  but  an  emptiness  not 
final  and  absolute  hke  that  at  ten  o'clock ;  an 
emptiness,  rather,  in  which  there  are  the  first  stirrings 
of  movement.  The  cabs  shift  slightly  on  the  ranks  ; 
the  cabmen  take  the  nose-bags  off  the  horses'  heads 
and  climb  up  on  their  perches.  There  is  an  ex- 
pectancy all  along  the  road  :  Italian  waiters  with 
tight  greasy  hair  and  white  aprons  stand  less  list- 
lessly at  the  tavern  doors ;  they  half  turn,  ready 
to  back  into  the  doorway  before  a  customer. 

As  you  walk  along,  the  stir  increases,  cabs  crawl 
out  of  side  streets  and  file  slowly  towards  the 
theatres ;  the  footmen  cluster  about  the  theatre- 
doors  ;  here  and  there  some  one  comes  out  hurriedly 
and  walks  down  the  street.  And  then,  all  of  a 
sudden,  as  if  at  some  unheard  signal,  the  wide 
doorways  are  blocked  with  slowly  struggling  crowds, 
you  see  tall  black  hats  of  men  and  the  many  coloured 
hair  of  women,  jammed  together,  and  slightly  sway- 
ing to  and  fro,  as  if  rocked  from  under.  Black 
figures  break  through  the  crowd,  and  detach 
themselves  against  the  wheels  of  the  hansoms,  a 
flying  and  disclosing  cloak  swishes  against  the 
shafts  and  is  engulfed  in  the  dark  hollow;  horses 
start,  stagger,   hammer  feverishly  with  their  hoofs 

179 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  are  off;  the  whole  roadway  is  black  with  cabs 
and  carriages,  and  the  omnibuses  seem  suddenly 
diminished.  The  pavement  is  blocked,  the  crowd 
of  the  doorway  now  sways  only  less  helplessly  upon 
the  pavement;  you  see  the  women's  distracted 
and  irritated  eyes,  their  hands  clutching  at  cloaks 
that  will  not  come  together,  the  absurd  and  anomal- 
ous glitter  of  diamonds  and  bare  necks  in  the 
streets. 

Westward  the  crowd  is  more  scattered,  has  more 
space  to  disperse.  The  Circus  is  like  a  whirlpool, 
streams  pour  steadily  outward  from  the  centre, 
where  the  fountain  stands  for  a  symbol.  The 
hghts  glitter  outside  theatres  and  music-halls  and 
restaurants;  lights  coruscate,  flash  from  the  walls, 
dart  from  the  vehicles ;  a  dark  tangle  of  roofs  and 
horses  knots  itself  together  and  swiftly  separates 
at  every  moment ;  all  the  pavements  are  aswarm 
with  people  hurrying. 

In  half  an  hour  all  this  outflow  will  have  sub- 
sided, and  then  one  distinguishes  the  slow  and 
melancholy  walk  of  women  and  men,  as  if  on  some 
kind  of  penitential  duty,  round  and  round  the 
Circus  and  along  Piccadilly  as  far  as  the  Duke  of 
Wellington's  house  and  long  Regent  Street  almost 
to  the  Circus.  Few  walk  on  the  left  side  of  Picca- 
dilly or  the  right  of  Regent  Street,  though  you 
hear  foreign  tongues  a-chatter  under  the  arcade. 
But  the  steady  procession  coils  backward  and 
forward,  thickening  and  slackening  as  it  rounds 
the  Circus,  where  innocent  people  wait  uncom- 
l8o 


Lond 


on. 


fortably  for  omnibuses,  standing  close  to  the  edge 
of  the  pavement.  Men  stand  watchfully  at  all  the 
corners,  with  their  backs  to  the  road ;  you  hear 
piping  voices,  shrill  laughter;  you  observe  that 
all  the  women's  eyes  are  turned  sideways,  never 
straight  in  front  of  them ;  and  that  they  seem 
often  to  hesitate,  as  if  they  were  not  sure  of  the  way, 
though  they  have  walked  in  that  procession  night 
after  night,  and  know  every  stone  of  the  pavement 
and  every  moulding  on  the  brass  rims  of  the  shop- 
windows.  The  same  faces  return,  lessen,  the  people 
come  out  of  the  restaurants  and  the  crowd  thickens 
for  ten  minutes,  then  again  lessens ;  and  fewer 
and  fewer  trudge  drearily  along  the  almost  deserted 
pavement.  The  staring  lights  are  blotted  suddenly 
from  the  walls ;  the  streets  seem  to  grow  chill, 
uninhabited,  unfriendly ;  the  few  hansoms  roam 
up  and  down  restlessly,  seeking  a  last  fare.  And 
still  a  few  dingy  figures  creep  along  by  the  inner 
edge  of  the  pavement,  stopping  by  the  closed  doors 
of  the  shops,  sometimes  speaking  dully  to  one 
another ;  then  trudging  heavily  along,  and  dis- 
appearing slowly  through  the  side  streets  eastward. 
The  part  of  London  I  have  always  known  best 
is  the  part  that  lies  between  the  Temple  and  Picca- 
dilly, and  some  of  it  no  longer  exists.  When  the 
Strand  was  widened,  Holywell  Street,  one  of  the 
oldest  and  quaintest  streets  in  London,  was  pulled 
down,  Wych  Street  went  too,  and  Clare  Market, 
and  many  dingy  and  twisting  lanes  which  could 
well    be    spared.     But    I    deeply    regret    Holywell 

i8i 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Street,  and  when  I  tell  strangers  about  it,  it  seems 
to  me  that  they  can  never  know  London  now.  I 
suppose  many  people  will  soon  forget  that  narrow 
lane  with  its  overhanging  wooden  fronts,  like  the 
houses  at  Coventry ;  or  they  will  remember  it  only 
for  its  surreptitious  shop-windows,  the  glass  always 
dusty,  through  which  one  dimly  saw  English 
translations  of  Zola  among  chemists'  paraphernalia. 
The  street  had  a  bad  reputation,  and  by  night 
doors  opened  and  shut  unexpectedly  up  dark  pass- 
ages. Perhaps  that  vague  dubiousness  added  a 
little  to  its  charm,  but  by  day  the  charm  was  a 
positive  one :  the  book-shops !  Perhaps  I  liked 
the  quays  at  Paris  even  better  :  it  was  Paris,  and 
there  was  the  river,  and  Notre  Dame,  and  it  was 
the  left  bank.  But  nowhere  else,  in  no  other  city, 
was  there  a  corner  so  made  for  book-fanciers. 
Those  dingy  shops  with  their  stalls  open  to  the 
street,  nearly  all  on  the  right,  the  respectable  side 
as  you  walked  west,  how  seldom  did  I  keep  my 
resolution  to  walk  past  them  with  unaverted  eyes, 
how  rarely  did  I  resist  their  temptations.  Half 
the  books  I  possess  were  bought  second-hand  in 
Holywell  Street,  and  what  bargains  I  have  made 
out  of  the  fourpenny  books  !  On  the  hottest  days, 
there  was  shade  there,  and  excuse  for  lounging. 
It  was  a  paradise  for  the  book-lover. 

It  never  occurred  to  me  that  any  street  so  old 
could  seem  worth  puUing  down;  but  the  improve- 
ments came,  and  that  and  the  less  interesting  streets 
near,  where  the  Globe  Theatre  was  (I  thought  it 
182 


London. 

no  loss)  had  of  course  to  go ;  and  Dane's  Inn  went, 
which  was  never  a  genuine  ''inn,"  but  had  some 
of  the  pleasant  genuine  dreariness ;  and  Clare 
Market  was  obliterated,  and  I  beheve  Drury  Lane 
is  getting  furbished  up  and  losing  its  old  savour 
of  squalor ;  and  Aldwych  is  there,  with  its  beautiful 
name,  but  itself  so  big  and  obvious  that  I  confess, 
with  my  recollections  of  what  was  there  before,  I 
can  never  find  my  way  in  it. 

Striking  westward,  my  course  generally  led 
me  through  Leicester  Square.  The  foreign  quarter 
of  London  radiates  from  Leicester  Square,  or  winds 
inward  to  that  point  as  to  a  centre.  Its  foreign 
aspect,  the  fact  that  it  was  the  park  of  Soho,  in- 
terested me.  In  Leicester  Square,  and  in  all  the 
tiny  streets  running  into  it,  you  are  never  in  the 
really  normal  London  :  it  is  an  escape,  a  sort  of 
shamefaced  and  sordid  and  yet  irresistible  reminder 
of  Paris  and  Italy.  The  little  restaurants  all  round 
brought  me  local  colour  before  I  had  seen  Italy; 
I  still  see  with  pleasure  the  straw-covered  bottles 
and  the  strings  of  maccaroni  in  the  undusted  win- 
dows. The  foreign  people  you  see  are  not  desirable 
people :  what  does  that  matter  if  you  look  on  them 
as  on  so  many  puppets  on  a  string,  and  their  shapes 
and  colours  come  as  a  relief  to  you  after  the  uniform 
puppets  of  English  make  .? 

I  have  always  been  apt  to  look  on  the  world  as 
a  puppet-show,  and  all  the  men  and  women  merely 
players,  whose  wires  we  do  not  see  working.  There 
is  a  passage  in  one  of  Keats'  letters  which  expresses 

183 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

just  what  I  have  always  felt:  "May  there  not," 
he  says,  "be  superior  beings,  amused  with  any 
graceful,  though  instinctive  attitude  my  mind  may 
fall  into,  as  I  am  entertained  with  the  alertness  of 
the  stoat  or  the  anxiety  of  a  deer  ? "  Is  there  not, 
in  our  aspect  towards  one  another,  something  in- 
evitably automatic  ?  Do  we  see,  in  the  larger  part 
of  those  fellow-creatures  whom  our  eyes  rest  on 
more  than  a  smile,  a  gesture,  a  passing  or  a  coming 
forward  ?  Are  they  more  real  to  us  than  the  actors 
on  a  stage,  the  quivering  phantoms  of  a  cinemato- 
graph ?  With  their  own  private  existence  we  have 
nothing  to  do  :  do  they  not,  so  far  as  we  are  con- 
cerned, exist  in  part  at  least  to  be  a  spectacle  to  us, 
to  convey  to  us  a  sense  of  life,  change,  beauty, 
variety,  necessity  ?  The  spectacle  of  human  life 
is  not  only  for  the  gods'  eyes,  but  for  ours ;  it  is 
ours  in  so  far  as  we  can  apprehend  it,  and  our 
pleasure  and  satisfaction  here  are  largely  dependent 
on  the  skill  with  which  we  have  trained  ourselves 
to  that  instinctive,  delighted  apprehension.  To 
a  few  here  and  there  we  can  come  closer,  we  can 
make  them,  by  some  illusion  of  the  affections, 
seem  more  real  to  us.  But  as  for  all  the  rest,  let 
us  be  content  to  admire,  to  wonder,  to  see  the  use 
and  beauty  and  curiosity  of  them,  and  intrude  no 
further  into  their  destinies. 

It  was  for  their  very  obvious  qualities  of  illusion 
that  I  liked  to  watch  the  people  in  the  foreign 
quarter.  They  were  like  prisoners  there,  thriving 
perhaps  but  discontented ;  none  of  them  light- 
184 


London. 

hearted,  as  they  would  have  been  in  their  own 
country;  grudgingly  at  home.  And  there  was 
much  piteous  false  show  among  them,  soiled  sordid 
ostentation,  a  little  of  what  we  see  in  the  older  songs 
of  Yvette  Guilbert. 

London  was  for  a  long  time  my  supreme  sensa- 
tion, and  to  roam  in  the  streets,  especially  after  the 
lamps  were  lighted,  my  chief  pleasure.  I  had  no 
motive  in  it,  merely  the  desire  to  get  Out  of  doors, 
and  to  be  among  people,  lights,  to  get  out  of  myself. 
Myself  has  always  been  so  absorbing  to  me  that  it 
was  perhaps  natural  that,  along  with  that  habitual 
companionship,  there  should  be  at  times  the  desire 
for  escape.  When  I  was  living  alone  in  the  Temple 
that  desire  came  over  me  almost  every  night,  and 
made  work,  or  thought  without  work,  impossible. 
Later  in  the  night  I  was  often  able  to  work  with 
perfect  quiet,  but  not  unless  I  had  been  out  in  the 
streets  first.  The  plunge  through  the  Middle 
Temple  gateway  was  like  the  swimmer's  plunge 
into  rough  water:  I  got  just  that  ''cool  shock" 
as  I  went  outside  into  the  brighter  hghts  and  the 
movement.  I  often  had  no  idea  where  I  was  going, 
I  often  went  nowhere.  I  walked,  and  there  were 
people  about  me. 

I  Hved  in  Fountain  Court  for  ten  years,  and 
I  thought  then,  and  think  still,  that  it  is  the  most 
beautiful  place  in  London.  Dutch  people  have 
told  me  that  the  Temple  is  like  a  little  Dutch  town, 
and  that  as  they  enter  from  Fleet  Street  into  Middle 
Temple   Lane   they   can    fancy   themselves    at   the 

185 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Hague.  Dutchmen  are  happy  if  they  have  much 
that  can  remind  them  of  Middle  Temple  Lane. 
There  is  a  moment  when  you  are  in  Fleet  Street ; 
you  have  forced  your  way  through  the  long  Strand, 
along  those  narrow  pavements,  in  a  continual  coming 
and  going  of  hurried  people,  with  the  continual 
rumble  of  wheels  in  the  road,  the  swaying  heights 
of  omnibuses  beside  you,  distracting  your  eyes, 
the  dust,  clatter,  confusion,  heat,  bewilderment 
of  that  thoroughfare ;  and  suddenly  you  go  under 
a  low  doorway,  where  large  wooden  doors  and  a 
smaller  side-door  stand  open,  and  you  are  suddenly 
in  quiet.  The  roar  has  dropped,  as  the  roar  of  the 
sea  drops  if  you  go  in  at  your  door  and  shut  it  behind 
you.  At  night,  when  one  had  to  knock,  and  so 
waited,  and  was  admitted  with  a  nice  formality, 
it  was  sometimes  almost  startling.  I  have  never 
felt  any  quiet  in  solitary  places  so  much  as  the 
quiet  of  that  contrast :  Fleet  Street  and  the 
Temple. 

No  wheels  could  come  nearer  to  me  in  Fountain 
Court  than  Middle  Temple  Lane,  but  I  liked  to 
hear  sometimes  at  night  a  faint  clattering,  only 
just  audible,  which  I  knew  was  the  sound  of  a 
cab  on  the  Embankment.  The  County  Council, 
steadily  ruining  London  with  the  persistence  of 
an  organic  disease,  is  busy  turning  the  Embank- 
ment into  a  gangway  for  electric  trams ;  but  when 
I  knew  it  it  was  a  quiet,  almost  secluded  place, 
where  people  sauntered  and  leaned  over  to  look 
into  the  water,  and  where,  at  night,  the  policemen 
l86 


London. 

would  walk  with  considerately  averted  head  past 
the  slumbering  heaps  of  tired  rags  on  the  seats. 

The  gates  on  the  Embankment  shut  early, 
but  I  often  came  home  by  the  river  and  I  could 
hardly  tear  myself  away  from  looking  over  that 
grey  harsh  parapet.  The  Neva  reminds  me  a 
little  of  the  Thames,  though  it  rushes  more  wildly, 
and  at  night  is  more  like  a  sea,  with  swift  lights 
crossing  it.  But  I  do  not  know  the  river  of  any 
great  capital  which  has  the  fascination  of  our  river. 
Whistler  has  created  the  Thames,  for  most  people ; 
but  the  Thames  existed  before  Whistler,  and  will 
exist  after  the  County  Council.  I  remember 
hearing  Claude  Monet  say,  at  the  time  when  he 
came  over  to  the  Savoy  Hotel,  year  by  year,  to 
paint  Waterloo  Bridge  from  its  windows,  that  he 
could  not  understand  why  any  English  painter 
ever  left  London.  I  felt  almost  as  if  the  river 
belonged  to  the  Temple :  its  presence  there,  cer- 
tainly, was  part  of  its  mysterious  anomaly,  a  frag- 
ment of  old  London,  walled  and  guarded  in  that 
corner  of  land  between  Fleet  Street  and  the  Thames. 

It  was  the  name,  partly,  that  had  drawn  me  to 
Fountain  Court,  and  the  odd  coincidence  that  I 
had  found  myself,  not  long  before,  in  what  was 
once  Blake's  Fountain  Court,  and  then  Southampton 
Buildings,  now  only  a  date  on  a  wall.  I  had  the 
top  flat  in  what  is  really  the  back  of  one  of  the  old 
houses  in  Essex  Street,  taken  into  the  Temple ; 
it  had  a  stone  balcony  from  which  I  looked  down 
on  a  wide  open  court,  with  a  stone  fountain  in  the 

187 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

middle,  broad  rows  of  stone  steps  leading  upward 
and  downward,  with  a  splendid  effect  of  decoration ; 
in  one  corner  of  the  court  was  Middle  Temple 
Hall,  where  a  play  of  Shakespeare's  was  acted 
while  Shakespeare  was  aUve;  all  around  were  the 
backs  of  old  buildings,  and  there  were  old  trees, 
under  which  there  was  a  bench  in  summer,  and  there 
was  the  glimpse  of  gardens  going  down  to  the 
Embankment.  By  day  it  was  as  legal  and  busy 
as  any  other  part  of  the  Temple,  but  the  mental 
business  of  the  law  is  not  inelegantly  expressed  in 
those  wigged  and  gowned  figures  who  are  generally 
to  be  seen  crossing  between  the  Law  Courts  and 
their  chambers  in  the  Temple.  I  felt,  when  I  saw 
them,  that  I  was  the  intruder,  the  modern  note, 
and  that  they  were  in  their  place,  and  keeping 
up  a  tradition.  But  at  night  I  had  the  place  to 
myself. 

The  nights  in  Fountain  Court  were  a  continual 
delight  to  me.  I  hved  then  chiefly  by  night,  and 
when  I  came  in  late  I  used  often  to  sit  on  the  bench 
under  the  trees,  where  no  one  else  ever  sat  at  those 
hours.  I  sat  there,  looking  at  the  silent  water  in 
the  basin  of  the  fountain,  and  at  the  leaves  overhead, 
and  at  the  sky  through  the  leaves  ;  and  that  soHtude 
was  only  broken  by  the  careful  policeman  on  guard, 
who  would  generally  stroll  up  to  be  quite  certain 
that  it  was  the  usual  loiterer,  who  had  a  right  to  sit 
there.  Sometimes  he  talked  with  me,  and  occasion- 
ally about  books ;  and  once  he  made  a  surprising 
and  profound  criticism,  for  on  my  asking  him  if 
i88 


London. 

he  had  read  Tennyson  he  said  no,  but  was  he  not 
rather  a  lady-hke  writer  ? 

When  Verlaine  stayed  with  me  he  wrote  a  poem 
about  Fountain  Court,  which  began  truthfully : 

La  Cour  de  la  Fontaine  est,  dans  le  Temple^ 
Un  coin  exquis  de  ce  coin  delicat 
Du  Londres  vieux. 

Dickens  of  course  has  written  about  the  fountain, 
but  there  is  only  one  man  who  could  ever  have 
given  its  due  to  that  corner  of  the  Temple,  and  he 
had  other,  less  lovely  corners  to  love.  I  say  over 
everything  Charles  Lamb  wrote  about  the  Temple, 
and  fancy  it  was  meant  for  Fountain  Court. 

More  than  once,  while  I  was  living  in  the 
Temple,  I  was  visited  by  a  strange  friend  of  mine, 
an  amateur  tramp,  with  whom  I  used  to  wander 
about  London  every  night  in  the  East  End,  and 
about  the  Docks,  and  in  all  the  more  squalid  parts 
of  the  city.  My  friend  was  born  a  wanderer,  and 
I  do  not  know  what  remains  for  him  in  the  world 
when  he  has  tramped  over  its  whole  surface.  I 
have  known  him  for  many  years,  and  we  have 
explored  many  cities  together,  and  crossed  more 
than  one  sea,  and  travelled  along  the  highroads  of 
more  than  one  country.  His  tramping  with  me 
was  not  very  serious,  but  when  he  is  alone  he  goes 
as  a  tramp  among  tramps,  taking  no  money  with 
him,  begging  his  way  with  beggars.  A  little,  pale, 
thin  young  man,  quietly  restless,  with  determined 
eyes  and  tight  hps,  a  face  prepared  for  all  disguises, 

189 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

yet  with  a  strangely  personal  life  looking  out  at  you, 
ambiguously  enough,  from  underneath,  he  is  never 
quite  at  home  under  a  roof  or  in  the  company  of 
ordinary   people,   where   he   seems   always   like   one 
caught    and    detained    unwillingly.     An    American, 
who  has  studied  in  a  German  University,  brought 
up,  during  all  his  early  hfe,  in  Berlin,  he  has  always 
had  a  fixed  distaste  for  the  interests  of  those  about 
him,  and  an  instinctive  passion  for  whatever  exists 
outside    the    border-line    which    shuts    us    in    upon 
respectability.     There  is  a  good  deal  of  affectation 
in  the  Hterary  revolt  against  respectability,  together 
with  a  child's  desire  to  shock  its  elders,  and  snatch 
a   lurid    reputation    from   those   whom    it   professes 
to  despise.     My  friend  has  never  had  any  of  this 
affectation;    life  is  not  a  masquerade  to  him,   and 
his  disguises  are  the  most  serious  part  of  his  life. 
The  simple  fact  is,  that  respectabihty,  the  normal 
existence  of  normal  people,  does  not  interest  him; 
he  could  not  even  tell  you  why,  without  searching 
consciously    for    reasons;     he   was    born    with    the 
soul  of  a  vagabond,  into  a  family  of  gentle,  exquisitely 
refined  people  :   he  was  born  so,  that  is  all.     Human 
curiosity,    curiosity    which    in    most    of   us    is    sub- 
ordinate to   some  more   definite   purpose,   exists   in 
him  for  its  own  sake;    it  is  his  inner  Hfe,  he  has 
no  other;    his  form  of  self-development,   his  form 
of  culture.     It  seems  to  me  that  this  man,  who  has 
seen  so  much  of  humanity,  who  has  seen  humanity 
so    closely,    where    it    has    least    temptation    to    be 
anything    but    itself,    has    really    achieved    culture 
190 


London. 

almost  perfect  of  its  kind,  though  the  kind  be  of 
his  own  invention.  He  is  not  an  artist,  who  can 
create ;  he  is  not  a  thinker  or  a  dreamer  or  a  man  of 
action ;  he  is  a  student  of  men  and  women,  and  of 
the  outcasts  among  men  and  women,  just  those 
persons  who  are  least  accessible,  least  cared  for, 
least  understood,  and  therefore,  to  one  like  my 
friend,  most  alluring.  He  is  not  conscious  of  it, 
but  I  think  there  is  a  great  pity  at  the  heart  of  this 
devouring  curiosity.  It  is  his  love  of  the  outcast 
which  makes  him  like  to  live  with  outcasts,  not 
as  a  visitor  in  their  midst,  but  as  one  of  them- 
selves. 

For  here  is  the  difference  between  this  man 
and  the  other  adventurers  who  have  gone  abroad 
among  tramps  and  criminals,  and  other  misunder- 
stood or  unfortunate  people.  Some  have  been 
philanthropists  and  have  gone  with  Bibles  in  their 
hands ;  others  have  been  journalists,  and  have  gone 
with  note-books  in  their  hands ;  all  have  gone  as 
visitors,  as  passing  visitors,  plunging  into  "the 
bath  of  multitude,"  as  one  might  go  holiday-making 
to  the  sea-side  and  plunge  into  the  sea.  But  this 
man,  wherever  he  has  gone,  has  gone  with  a  com- 
plete abandonment  to  his  surroundings ;  no  tramp 
has  ever  known  that  "Cigarette"  was  not  really 
a  tramp ;  he  has  begged,  worked,  ridden  outside 
trains,  slept  in  workhouses  and  gaols,  not  shirked 
one  of  the  hardships  of  his  way ;  and  all  the  time 
he  has  been  living  his  own  life  (whatever  that 
enigma  may  be !)   more  perfectly,  I  am  sure,  than 

191 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

when  he  is  dining  every  day  at  his  mother's  or  his 
sister's  table. 

The  desire  of  travelHng  on  many  roads,  and 
the  desire  of  seeing  many  foreign  faces,  are  almost 
always  found  united  in  that  half-unconscious  instinct 
which  makes  a  man  a  vagabond.  But  I  have 
never  met  any  one  in  whom  the  actual  love  of  the 
road  is  so  strong  as  it  is  in  my  friend.  In  America, 
where  the  tramps  ride  over  and  under  the  trains, 
in  order  that  they  may  get  on  the  other  side  of  a 
thousand  miles ,  without  spending  a  lifetime  about 
it,  he,  too,  has  gone  by  rail,  not  as  a  passenger. 
And  I  remember  a  few  years  ago,  when  we  had 
given  one  another  rendezvous  at  St.  Petersburg, 
that  I  found,  when  I  got  there,  that  he  was  already 
half-way  across  Siberia,  on  the  new  railway  which 
they  were  in  the  act  of  making.  Also  I  have  been 
with  him  to  Hamburg  and  Le  Havre  and  Antwerp 
by  sea :  once  on  an  Atlantic  liner,  loaded  with 
foreign  Jews,  among  whom  he  spent  most  of  his 
time  in  the  Steerage.  But  for  the  most  part  he 
walks.  Wherever  he  walks  he  makes  friends ; 
when  we  used  to  walk  about  London  together  he 
would  stop  to  talk  with  every  drunken  old  woman 
in  Drury  Lane,  and  get  into  the  confidence  of  every 
sailor  whom  we  came  upon  in  the  pot-houses  about 
the  docks.  He  is  not  fastidious,  and  will  turn  his 
hand,  as  the  phrase  is,  to  anything.  And  he  goes 
through  every  sort  of  privation,  endures  dirt, 
accustoms  himself  to  the  society  of  every  variety 
of  his  fellow-creatures  without  a  murmur  or  regret. 
192 


London. 

After  all,  comfort  is  a  convention,  and  pleasure 
an  individual  thing,  to  every  individual.  "To 
travel  is  to  die  continually,"  wrote  a  half-crazy 
poet  who  spent  most  of  the  years  of  a  short  fantastic 
life  in  London.  Well,  that  is  a  hne  which  I  have 
often  found  myself  repeating  as  I  shivered  in 
railway-stations  on  the  other  side  of  Europe,  or  lay 
in  a  plunging  berth  as  the  foam  chased  the  snow- 
flakes  off  the  deck.  One  finds,  no  doubt,  a  par- 
ticular pleasure  in  looking  back  on  past  discomforts, 
and  I  am  convinced  that  a  good  deal  of  the  attraction 
of  travelling  comes  from  an  unconscious  throwing 
forward  of  the  mind  to  the  time  when  the  un- 
comfortable present  shall  have  become  a  stirring 
memory  of  the  past.  But  I  am  speaking  now  for 
those  in  whom  a  certain  luxuriousness  of  tempera- 
ment finds  itself  in  sharp  conflict  with  the  desire  of 
movement.  To  my  friend,  I  think,  this  is  hardly 
a  conceivable  state  of  mind.  He  is  a  Stoic,  as  the 
true  adventurer  should  be.  Rest,  even  as  a  change, 
does  not  appeal  to  him.  He  thinks  acutely,  but 
only  about  facts,  about  the  facts  before  him ;  and 
so  he  does  not  need  to  create  an  atmosphere  about 
himself  which  change  might  disturb.  He  is  fond 
of  his  family,  his  friends ;  but  he  can  do  without 
them,  like  a  man  with  a  mission.  He  has  no 
mission,  only  a  great  thirst ;  and  this  thirst  for  the 
humanity  of  every  nation  and  for  the  roads  of  every 
country  drives  him  onward  as  resistlessly  as  the 
drunkard's  thirst  for  drink,  or  the  idealist's  thirst 
for  an  ideal. 

193 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

And  it  seems  to  me  that  few  men  have  realised, 
as  this  man  has  reahsed,  that  "not  the  fruit  of 
experience,  but  experience  itself,  is  the  end."  He 
has  chosen  his  life  for  himself,  and  he  has  lived  it, 
regardless  of  anything  else  in  the  world.  He  has 
desired  strange,  almost  inaccessible  things,  and 
he  has  attained  whatever  he  has  desired.  While 
other  men  have  lamented  their  fate,  wished  their 
lives  different,  nursed  vague  ambitions,  and  dreamed 
fruitless  dreams,  he  has  quietly  given  up  comfort 
and  conventionality,  not  caring  for  them,'  and  he 
has  gone  his  own  way  without  even  stopping  to 
think  whether  the  way  were  difficult  or  desirable. 
Not  long  since,  walking  with  a  friend  in  the  streets 
of  New  York,  he  said  suddenly:  "Do  you  know, 
I  wonder  what  it  is  hke  to  chase  a  man .?  I  know 
what  it  is  like  to  be  chased,  but  to  chase  a  man 
would  be  a  new  sensation."  The  other  man  laughed, 
and  thought  no  more  about  it.  A  week  later  my 
friend  came  to  him  with  an  official  document :  he 
had  been  appointed  a  private  detective.  He  was 
set  on  the  track  of  a  famous  criminal  (whom,  as  it 
happened,  he  had  known  as  a  tramp)  ;  he  made 
his  plans,  worked  them  out  successfully,  and  the 
criminal  was  caught.  To  have  done  was  enough  : 
he  had  had  the  sensation;  he  has  done  no  more 
work  as  a  detective.  Is  there  not,  in  this  curiosity 
in  action,  this  game  mastered  and  then  cast  aside, 
a  wonderful  promptness,  sureness,  a  moral  quality 
which  is  itself  success  in  life  ? 

To  desire  so  much,  and  what  is  so  human,  to 
194 


London. 

make  one's  life  out  of  the  very  fact  of  living  it  as 
one  chooses ;  to  create  a  unique  personal  satisfaction 
out  of  discontent  and  curiosity ;  to  be  so  much 
oneself  in  learning  so  much  from  other  people : 
is  not  this,  in  its  way,  an  ideal,  and  has  not  my  friend 
achieved  it  ?  What  I  like  in  him  so  much  is  that 
he  is  a  vagabond  without  an  object.  He  has 
written  one  book,  but  writing  has  come  to  him  as 
an  accident ;  and,  in  writing,  his  danger  is  to  be 
too  literal  for  art,  and  not  quite  literal  enough  for 
science.  He  is  too  completely  absorbed  in  people 
and  things  to  be  able  ever  to  get  aloof  from  them ; 
and  to  write  well  of  what  one  has  done  and  seen 
one  must  be  able  to  get  aloof  from  oneself  and  from 
others.  If  ever  a  man  loved  wandering  for  its 
own  sake  it  was  George  Borrow ;  but  George 
Borrow  had  a  serious  and  whimsical  brain  always 
at  work,  twisting  the  things  that  he  saw  into  shapes 
that  pleased  him  more  than  the  shapes  of  the  things 
in  themselves.  My  friend  is  interested  in  what 
he  calls  sociology,  but  the  interest  is  almost  as 
accidental  as  his  interest  in  literature  or  in  phil- 
anthropy. He  has  the  soul  and  feet  of  the  vaga- 
bond, the  passion  of  the  roads.  He  is  restless  under 
any  roof  but  the  roof  of  stars.  He  cares  passion- 
ately for  men  and  women,  not  because  they  are 
beautiful  or  good  or  clever,  or  because  he  can  do 
them  good,  or  because  they  can  be  serviceable  to 
him,  but  because  they  are  men  and  women.  And 
he  cares  for  men  and  women  where  they  are  most 
vividly  themselves,  where  they  have  least  need  for 

195 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

disguise ;  for  poor  people,  and  people  on  the  roads, 
idle  people,  criminals  sometimes,  the  people  who 
are  so  much  themselves  that  they  are  no  longer  a 
part  of  society.  He  wanders  over  the  whole  earth, 
but  he  does  not  care  for  the  beauty  or  strangeness 
of  what  he  sees,  only  for  the  people.  Writing  to 
me  lately  from  Samarcand,  he  said:  "I  have  seen 
the  tomb  of  the  prophet  Daniel ;  I  have  seen  the 
tomb  of  Tamerlane."  But  Tamerlane  was  nothing 
to  him,  the  prophet  Daniel  was  nothing  to  him. 
He  mentioned  them  only  because  they  would 
interest  me.  He  was  trying  to  puzzle  out  and 
piece  together  the  psychology  of  the  Persian  beggar 
whom  he  had  left  at  the  corner  of  the  way. 


196 


IV. 

When  my  French  friends  come  to  London  they 
say  to  me :  where  is  your  Montmartre,  where  is 
your  Quartier  Latin  ?  We  have  no  Montmartre 
(not  even  Chelsea  is  that),  no  Quartier  Latin, 
because  there  is  no  instinct  in  the  Enghshman  to 
be  companionable  in  public.  Occasions  are  lacking, 
it  is  true,  for  the  cafe  is  responsible  for  a  good  part 
of  the  artistic  Bohemianism  of  Paris,  and  we  have 
no  cafes.  I  prophesy  in  these  pages  that  some  day 
some  one,  probably  an  American  who  has  come  by 
way  of  Paris,  will  set  back  the  plate-glass  windows 
in  many  angles,  which  I  could  indicate  to  him,  of 
the  Strand^  Piccadilly,  and  other  streets,  and  will 
turn  the  whole  wall  into  windows,  and  leave  a  space 
in  front  for  a  terrasse,  in  the  Paris  manner,  and  we 
shall  have  cafes  like  the  cafes  in  Paris,  and  the 
prestidigitateur  who  has  done  this  will  soon  have 
made  a  gigantic  fortune.  But  meanwhile  let  us 
recognise  that  there  is  in  London  no  companionship 
in  public  (in  the  open  air  or  visible  through  windows) 
and  that  nothing  in  Cafes  Royaux  and  Monicos 
and  the  like  can  have  the  sort  of  meaning  for  young 
men  in  London  that  the  cafes  have  long  had,  and 
still  have,  in  Paris.  Attempts  have  been  made, 
and  I  have  shared  in  them,  and  for  their  time  they 
had  their  entertainment ;  but  I  have  not  seen  one 
that  flourished. 

I  remember  the  desperate  experiments  of  some 
to  whom  Paris,  from  a  fashion,  had  become  almost 
a   necessity ;    and   how   Dowson  took  to   cabmen's 

197 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

shelters  as  a  sort  of  supper-club.  Different  taverns 
were  at  different  times  haunted  by  young  writers ; 
some  of  them  came  for  the  drink  and  some  for  the 
society;  and  one  bold  attempt  was  made  to  get 
together  a  cenacle  in  quite  the  French  manner  in 
the  upper  room  of  a  famous  old  inn.  In  London 
we  cannot  read  our  poems  to  one  another,  as  they 
do  in  Paris ;  we  cannot  even  talk  about  our  own 
works,  frankly,  with  a  natural  pride,  a  good- 
humoured  equality.  They  can  do  that  in  Dublin, 
and  in  an  upper  room  in  Dublin  I  find  it  quite 
natural.  But  in  London  even  those  of  us  who  are 
least  Anglo-Saxon  cannot  do  it.  Is  it  more,  I 
wonder,  a  loss  to  us  or  a  gain  ? 

This  lack  of  easy  meeting  and  talking  is  certainly 
one  of  the  reasons  why  there  have  been  in  England 
many  great  writers  but  few  schools.  In  Paris  a 
young  man  of  twenty  starts  a  "school"  as  he  starts 
a  "revue";  and  these  hasty  people  are  in  France 
often  found  among  the  people  who  last.  In  modern 
England  we  have  gained,  more  than  we  think  per- 
haps, from  the  accidents  of  neighbourhood  that  set 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  walking  and  talking 
together.  As  it  was  England,  and  one  of  them 
was  Wordsworth,  they  met  in  Cumberland ;  in 
London  we  have  had  nothing  like  the  time  of 
Victor  Hugo,  when  Baudelaire  and  Gautier  and 
Gerard  de  Nerval  and  men  of  obscure  and  vagabond 
genius  made  Paris  vital,  a  part  of  themselves,  a 
form  of  creative  literature.  That  is  what  London 
has  in  itself  the  genius,  the  men  and  the  material, 
198 


London. 

to  be ;  but  of  the  men  of  our  time  only  Henley  and 
John  Davidson  have  loved  it  or  struck  music  out 
of  it. 

If  we  had  only  had  a  Walt  Whitman  for  London  ! 
Whitman  is  one  of  the  voices  of  the  earth,  and  it  is 
only  in  Whitman  that  the  paving-stones  really  speak, 
with  a  voice  as  authentic  as  the  voice  of  the  hills. 
He  knew  no  distinction  between  what  is  called  the 
work  of  nature  and  what  is  the  work  of  men.  He 
left  out  nothing,  and  what  still  puzzles  us  is  the 
blind,  loving,  embracing  way  in  which  he  brings 
crude  names  and  things  into  his  vision,  the  name 
of  a  trade,  a  street,  a  territory,  no  matter  what 
syllables  it  might  carry  along  with  it.  He  created 
a  vital  poetry  of  cities ;  it  was  only  a  part  of  what 
he  did  ;  but  since  Whitman  there  is  no  gainsaying 
it  any  longer. 

When  I  came  to  London,  I  knew  nothing  of 
the  great  things  that  Whitman  had  done,  or  that 
it  was  possible  to  do  them  in  such  a  way ;  but  I 
had  my  own  feeling  for  London,  my  own  point  of 
view  there,  and  I  found  myself  gradually  trying 
to  paint,  or  to  set  to  music,  to  paint  in  music,  perhaps, 
those  sensations  which  London  awakened  in  me. 
I  was  only  trying  to  render  what  I  saw  before  me, 
what  I  felt,  and  to  make  my  art  out  of  Hving  material. 
"Books  made  out  of  books  pass  away"  was  a  sen- 
tence I  never  forgot,  and  my  application  of  it  was 
direct  and  immediate. 

I  have  always  been  curious  of  sensations,  and 
above  all  of  those  which  seemed  to  lead  one  into 

199 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

"artificial  paradises"  not  within  everybody's  reach. 
It  took  me  some  time  to  find  out  that  every  "  artificial 
paradise"  is  within  one's  own  soul,  somewhere 
among  one's  own  dreams,  and  that  haschisch  is  a 
poor  substitute  for  the  imagination.  The  mystery 
of  all  the  intoxicants  fascinated  me,  and  drink, 
which  had  no  personal  appeal  to  me,  which  indeed 
brought  me  no  pleasures,  found  me  endlessly 
observant  of  its  powers,  eff'ects,  and  variations. 

Many  of  my  friends  drank,  and  I  was  forced 
to  become  acquainted  with  the  different  forms 
which  liquor  could  take,  so  that  I  could  almost 
label  them  in  their  classes.  Thus  one,  whom  I 
will  call  A.,  drank  copiously,  continually,  all  drinks, 
for  pleasure :  he  could  carry  so  much  so  steadily 
that  he  sometimes  passed  his  limit  without  knowing 
it :  not  that  he  minded  passing  the  limit,  but  he 
liked  to  be  conscious  of  it.  B.  drank  to  become 
unconscious,  he  passed  his  limit  rapidly,  and  became 
first  apologetic,  then  quarrelsome.  His  friend  C, 
a  man  abstract  in  body  and  mind,  who  muttered  in 
Greek  when  he  was  least  conscious  of  himself,  and 
sat  with  imperturbable  gravity,  drinking  hke  an 
ascetic,  until  his  head  fell  without  warning  on  the 
table,  seemed  to  compete  with  B.  in  how  to  finish 
soonest  with  a  hfe  which  he  had  no  desire  to  get 
rid  of.  I  do  not  think  he  ever  got  any  pleasure 
out  of  drinking :  he  would  sit  up  over  night  with 
absinthe  and  cigarettes  in  order  to  be  awake  to 
attend  early  mass ;  but  though  his  will  was  strong 
enough  for  that,  the  habit  was  stronger  than  his 
200 


London. 

will,  and  he  seemed  like  one  condemned  to  that 
form  of  suicide  without  desire  or  choice  in  the 
matter.  D.  drank  for  pleasure,  but  he  was  scrupu- 
lous in  what  he  drank,  and  would  take  menthe  verte 
for  its  colour,  absinthe  because  it  lulled  him  with 
vague  dreams,  ether  because  it  could  be  taken  on 
strawberries.  I  remember  his  telling  me  exactly 
what  it  feels  like  to  have  delirium  tremens,  and  he 
told  it  minutely,  self-pityingly,  but  with  a  relish ; 
not  without  a  melancholy  artistic  pride  in  the  sensa- 
tions, their  strangeness,  and  the  fact  that  he  should 
have  been  the  victim. 

There  were  others ;  there  was  even  one  who 
cured  himself  in  some  miraculous  way,  and  could 
see  his  friends  drink  champagne  at  his  expense, 
while  he  drank  soda-water.  All  these  I  wondered 
at  and  fancied  that  I  understood,  I  admit  that  I 
was  the  more  interested  in  these  men  because  they 
were  living  in  the  way  I  call  artificial.  I  never 
thought  any  one  the  better  for  being  a  spendthrift 
of  any  part  of  his  energies,  but  I  certainly  often 
found  him  more  interesting  than  those  who  were 
not  spendthrifts. 

I  also  found  a  peculiar  interest  in  another  part 
of  what  is  artificial,  properly  artificial,  in  London. 
A  city  is  no  part  of  nature,  and  one  may  choose 
among  the  many  ways  in  which  something  peculiar 
to  walls  and  roofs  and  artificial  lighting,  is  carried 
on.  All  commerce  and  all  industries  have  their 
share  in  taking  us  further  from  nature  and  further 
from  our  needs,  as  they  create  about  us  unnatural 

20 1 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

conditions  which  are  really  what  develop  in  us  these 
new,  extravagant,  really  needless  needs.  And  the 
whole  night-world  of  the  stage  is,  in  its  way,  a  part 
of  the  very  soul  of  cities.  That  lighted  gulf,  before 
which  the  footlights  are  the  flaming  stars  between 
world  and  world,  shows  the  city  the  passions  and 
that  beauty  which  the  soul  of  man  in  cities  is  occupied 
in  weeding  out  of  its  own  fruitful  and  prepared  soil. 
.  That  is,  the  theatres  are  there  to  do  so,  they 
have  no  reason  for  existence  if  they  do  not  do  so ; 
but  for  the  most  part  they  do  not  do  so.  The 
English  theatre  with  its  unreal  realism  and  its  un- 
imaginative pretences  towards  poetry  left  me  un- 
touched and  unconvinced.  I  found  the  beauty, 
the  poetry,  that  I  wanted  only  in  two  theatres  that 
were  not  looked  upon  as  theatres,  the  Alhambra 
and  the  Empire.  The  ballet  seemed  to  me  the 
subtlest  of  the  visible  arts,  and  dancing  a  more 
significant  speech  than  words.  I  could  almost 
have  said  seriously,  as  Verlaine  once  said  in  jest, 
coming  away  from  the  Alhambra  :  "  J'aime  Shake- 
speare, mais  .  .  .  j'aime  mieux  le  ballet!"  Why 
is  it  that  one  can  see  a  ballet  fifty  times,  always 
with  the  same  sense  of  pleasure,  while  the  most 
absorbing  play  becomes  a  little  tedious  after  the 
third  time  of  seeing  t  For  one  thing,  because 
the  difference  between  seeing  a  play  and  seeing  a 
ballet  is  just  the  difference  between  reading  a  book 
and  looking  at  a  picture.  One  returns  to  a  picture 
as  one  returns  to  nature,  for  a  delight  which,  being 
purely  of  the  senses,  never  tires,  never  distresses, 
202 


London. 

never  varies.  To  read  a  book  even  for  the  first 
time,  requires  a  certain  effort.  The  book  must 
indeed  be  exceptional  that  can  be  read  three  or 
four  times,  and  no  book  was  ever  written  that  could 
be  read  three  or  four  times  in  succession.  A  ballet 
is  simply  a  picture  in  movement.  It  is  a  picture 
where  the  imitation  of  nature  is  given  by  nature 
itself;  where  the  figures  of  the  composition  are 
real,  and  yet,  by  a  very  paradox  of  travesty,  have 
a  delightful,  deliberate  air  of  unreality.  It  is  a 
picture  where  the  colours  change,  re-combine, 
before  one's  eyes ;  where  the  outlines  melt  into 
one  another,  emerge,  and  are  again  lost,  in  the 
kaleidoscopic  movement  of  the  dance.  Here  we 
need  tease  ourselves  with  no  philosophies,  need 
endeavour  to  read  none  of  the  riddles  of  existence ; 
may  indeed  give  thanks  to  be  spared  for  one  hour 
the  imbecility  of  human  speech.  After  the  tedium 
of  the  theatre,  where  we  are  called  on  to  interest 
ourselves  in  the  improbable  fortunes  of  uninteresting 
people,  how  welcome  is  the  relief  of  a  spectacle 
which  professes  to  be  no  more  than  merely  beautiful ; 
which  gives  us,  in  accomplished  dancing,  the  most 
beautiful  human  sight ;  which  provides,  in  short, 
the  one  escape  into  fairyland  which  is  permitted 
by  that  tyranny  of  the  real  which  is  the  worst 
tyranny  of  modern  life. 

The  most  magical  glimpse  I  ever  caught  of  a 
ballet  was  from  the  road  in  front,  from  the  other 
side  of  the  road,  one  night  when  two  doors  were 
suddenly  thrown  open   as   I   was   passing.     In  the 

203 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

moment's  interval  before  the  doors  closed  again,  I 
saw,  in  that  odd,  unexpected  way,  over  the  heads 
of  the  audience,  far  off  in  a  sort  of  blue  mist,  the 
whole   stage,   its   briUiant  crowd   drawn   up   in  the 
last  pose,  just  as  the  curtain  was  beginning  to  go 
down.     It  stamped  itself  in  my  brain,  an  impression 
caught  just  at  the  perfect  moment,  by  some  rare 
felicity  of  chance.     But  that  is  not  an  impression 
that  can  be  repeated.     For  the  most  part  I  like  to 
see  my  illusions   clearly,   recognising  them   as  illu- 
sions,   and    so     heightening    their    charm.     I     like 
to  see  a  ballet  from  the  wings,  a  spectator,  but  in 
the  midst  of  the  magic.     To  see  a  ballet  from  the 
wings  is  to  lose  all  sense  of  proportion,  all  knowledge 
of  the  piece  as  a  whole,  but,  in  return,  it  is  fruitful 
in  happy  accidents,  in  momentary  points  of  view, 
in  chance  felicities  of  light   and  shade  and   move- 
ment.    It  is  almost  to  be  in  the  performance  oneself, 
and  yet  passive,  with  the  leisure  to  look  about  one. 
You  see  the  reverse  of  the  picture :   the  girls  at  the 
back   lounging   against   the   set   scenes,   turning   to 
talk  with  some  one  at  the  side ;    you  see  how  lazily 
some  of  them  are  moving,  and  how  mechanical  and 
irregular   are   the   motions   that   flow   into   rhythm 
when    seen    from    the    front.     Now   one    is    in    the 
centre  of  a  joking  crowd,  hurrying  from  the  dressing- 
rooms  to  the  stage;    now  the  same  crowd  returns, 
charging  at  full  speed  between  the  scenery,  every 
one  trying  to  reach  the  dressing-room  stairs  first. 
And   there   is    the   constant   travelling   of  scenery, 
from  which  one  has  a  series  of  escapes,  as  it  bears 
204 


London. 

down  unexpectedly  in  some  new  direction.  The 
ballet  half  seen  in  the  centre  of  the  stage,  seen  in 
sections,  has,  in  the  ghmpses  that  can  be  caught  of 
it,  a  contradictory  appearance  of  mere  nature  and 
of  absolute  unreality.  And  beyond  the  footlights, 
on  the  other  side  of  the  orchestra,  one  can  see  the 
boxes  near  the  stalls,  the  men  standing  by  the  bar, 
an  angle  cut  sharply  off  from  the  stalls,  with  the 
light  full  on  the  faces,  the  intent  eyes,  the  grey 
smoke  curling  up  from  the  cigarettes  :  a  Degas,  in 
short. 

And  there  is  a  charm,  which  I  cannot  think 
wholly  imaginary  or  factitious,  in  that  form  of 
illusion  which  is  known  as  make-up.  To  a  plain 
face,  it  is  true,  make-up  only  intensifies  plainness; 
for  make-up  does  but  give  colour  and  piquancy  to 
what  is  already  in  a  face,  it  adds  nothing  new.  But 
to  a  face  already  charming,  how  becoming  all  this 
is,  what  a  new  kind  of  exciting  savour  it  gives  to 
that  real  charm !  It  has,  to  the  remnant  of  Puritan 
conscience  or  consciousness  that  is  the  heritage 
of  us  all,  a  certain  sense  of  dangerous  wickedness, 
the  delight  of  forbidden  fruit.  The  very  phrase, 
painted  women,  has  come  to  have  an  association 
of  sin  and  to  have  put  paint  on  her  cheeks,  though 
for  the  innocent  necessities  of  her  profession,  gives 
to  a  woman  a  kind  of  symbohc  corruption.  At 
once  she  seems  to  typify  the  sorceries,  and  entangle- 
ments of  what  is  most  deliberately  enticing  in  her 
sex : 

Femina  dulce  malum,  pariter  favus  atque  venenum  — 

20S 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

with  all  that  is  most  subtle,  least  like  nature,  in  her 
power  to  charm.  Maquillage,  to  be  attractive, 
must  of  course  be  unnecessary.  As  a  disguise  for 
age  or  misfortune,  it  has  no  interest.  But,  of  all 
places,  on  the  stage,  and,  of  all  people,  on  the 
cheeks  of  young  people ;  there,  it  seems  to  me  that 
make-up  is  intensely  fascinating,  and  its  recognition 
is  of  the  essence  of  my  delight  in  a  stage  perform- 
ance. I  do  not  for  a  moment  want  really  to  believe 
in  what  I  see  before  me ;  to  believe  that  those  wigs 
are  hair,  that  grease-paint  a  blush;  any  more  than 
I  want  really  to  beheve  that  the  actor  who  has  just 
crossed  the  stage  in  his  everyday  clothes  has  turned 
into  an  actual  King  when  he  puts  on  clothes  that 
look  hke  a  King's  clothes.  I  know  that  a  delightful 
imposition  is  being  practised  upon  me;  that  I  am 
to  see  fairyland  for  a  while;  and  to  me  all  that 
glitters  shall  be  gold. 

The  ballet  in  particular,  but  also  the  whole 
surprising  life  of  the  music-halls,  took  hold  of  me 
with  the  charm  of  what  was  least  real  among  the 
pompous  and  distressing  unrealities  of  a  great 
city.  And  some  form  I  suppose  of  that  instinct 
which  has  created  the  gladiatorial  shows  and  the 
bull-fight  made  me  fascinated  by  the  faultless  and 
fatal  art  of  the  acrobat,  who  sets  his  life  in  the 
wager,  and  wins  the  wager  by  sheer  skill,  a  triumph 
of  fine  shades.  That  love  of  fine  shades  took  me 
angrily  past  the  spoken  vulgarities  of  most  music- 
hall  singing  (how  much  more  priceless  do  they  make 
the  silence  of  dancing !)  to  that  one  great  art  of  fine 
206 


London. 

shades,  made  up  out  of  speech  just  Ufted  into  song, 
which  has  been  revealed  to  us  by  Yvette  Guilbert. 
I   remember  when   I    first   heard   her    in    Paris, 
and   tried   vainly   at   the  time,   to  get  the   Enghsh 
managers  to  bring  her  over  to  London.     She  sang 
"Sainte  Galette,"  and  as  I  listened  to  the  song  I 
felt  a  cold  shiver  run  down  my  back,  that  shiver 
which  no  dramatic  art  except  that  of  Sarah   Bern- 
hardt had  ever  given  me.     It  was  not  this  that  I 
was  expecting  to  find  in  the  thin  woman  with  the 
long    black    gloves.     I    had    heard    that    her    songs 
were   immoral,    and   that    her   manner   was    full   of 
underhand  intention.     What  I  found  was  a  moral 
so  poignant,  so  human,  that  I  could  scarcely  endure 
the  pity  of  it,  it  made  me  feel  that  I  was  wicked, 
not  that  she  was ;    I,  to  have  looked  at  these  dread- 
fully serious  things  Hghtly.     Later  on,  in  London, 
I  heard  her  sing  "La  Soularde,"  that  song  in  which, 
as   Goncourt   notes   in   his  journal,    "la   diseuse   de 
chansonnettes    se    revele    comme    une    grande,    une 
tres  grande  actrice  tragique,  vous  mettant  au  coeur 
une  constriction  angoisseuse."     It  is  about  an  old 
drunken    woman,    whom    the    children    follow    and 
laugh   at  in   the  streets.     Yvette   imitates   her  old 
waggling    head,    her    tottering    walk,    her    broken 
voice,  her  little  sudden  furies,  her  miserable  resigna- 
tion ;    she  suggests  all  this,  almost  without  moving, 
by  the  subtlest  pantomime,  the  subtlest  inflections 
of  voice    and    face,    and    she    thrills    you   with    the 
grotesque  pathos  of  the  whole  situation,  with  the 
intense  humanity  of  it.     I  imagine  such  a  situation 

207 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

rendered  by  an  English  music-hall  singer !  Imagine 
the  vulgarity,  the  inhumanity,  of  the  sort  of  beery 
caricature  that  we  should  get,  in  place  of  this 
absolutely  classic  study  in  the  darker  and  more 
sordid  side  of  hfe.  The  art  of  Yvette  Guilbert 
is  always  classic;  it  has  restraint,  form,  dignity, 
in  its  wildest  licence.  Its  secret  is  its  expressive- 
ness, and  the  secret  of  that  expressiveness  lies 
perhaps  largely  in  its  attention  to  detail.  Others 
are  content  with  making  an  effect,  say  twice,  in  the 
course  of  a  song.  Yvette  Guilbert  insists  on  getting 
the  full  meaning  out  of  every  line,  but  quietly, 
without  emphasis,  as  if  in  passing;  and,  with  her, 
to  grasp  a  meaning  is  to  gain  an  effect. 

There  was  the  one  great  artist  of  that  world 
which,  before  I  could  apprehend  it,  had  to  be 
reflected  back  to  me  as  in  some  bewildering  mirror. 
It  was  out  of  mere  curiosity  that  I  had  found  my 
way  into  that  world,  into  that  mirror,  but,  once 
there,  the  thing  became  material  for  me.  I  tried 
to  do  in  verse  something  of  what  Degas  had  done 
in  painting.  I  was  conscious  of  transgressing  no 
law  of  art  in  taking  that  scarcely  touched  material 
for  new  uses.  Here,  at  least,  was  a  decor  which 
appealed  to  me,  and  which  seemed  to  me  full  of 
strangeness,  beauty,  and  significance.  I  still  think 
that  there  is  a  poetry  in  this  world  of  illusion,  not 
less  genuine  of  its  kind  than  that  more  easily  appre- 
hended poetry  of  a  world,  so  little  more  real,  that 
poets  have  mostly  turned  to.  It  is  part  of  the 
poetry  of  cities,  and  it  waits  for  us  in  London. 
208 


V. 

A  CITY  is  characterised  by  its  lights,  and  it  is  to  its 
Hghts,  acting  on  its  continual  mist,  that  London 
owes  much  of  the  mystery  of  its  beauty.  On  a 
winter  afternoon  every  street  in  London  becomes 
mysterious.  You  see  even  the  shops  through  a 
veil,  people  are  no  longer  distinguishable  as  persons, 
but  are  a  nimble  flock  of  shadows.  Lights  travel 
and  dance  through  alleys  that  seem  to  end  in  dark- 
ness. Every  row  of  gas  lamps  turns  to  a  trail  of 
fire ;  fiery  stars  shoot  and  flicker  in  the  night. 
Night  becomes  palpable,  and  not  only  an  absence 
of  the  light  of  day. 

The  most  beautiful  lighting  of  a  city  is  the 
lighting  of  one  street  in  Rome  by  low-swung 
globes  of  gas  that  hang  like  oranges  down  the  Via 
Nazionale,  midway  between  the  houses.  In  London 
we  light  casually,  capriciously,  every  one  at  his 
own  will,  and  so  there  are  blinding  shafts  at  one 
step  and  a  pit  of  darkness  at  the  next,  and  it  is  an 
adventure  to  follow  the  lights  in  any  direction,  the 
lights  are  all  significant  and  mean  some  place  of 
entertainment  or  the  ambition  of  some  shopkeeper. 
They  draw  one  by  the  mere  curiosity  to  find  out 
why  they  are  there,  what  has  set  them  signalling. 
And,  as  you  walk  beyond  or  aside  from  the  shops, 
all  these  private  illuminations  are  blotted  out,  and 
the  dim,  sufficing  street-gas  of  the  lamp-posts  takes 
their  place. 

The  canals,  in  London,  have  a  mysterious 
quality,  made  up  of  sordid  and  beautiful  elements, 

209 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

now  a  black  trail,  horrible,  crawling  secretly;  now 
a  sudden  opening,  as  at  Maida  Vale,  between  dull 
houses,  upon  the  sky.  At  twilight  in  winter  the 
canal  smokes  and  flares,  a  long  hne  of  water  with 
its  double  row  of  lamps,  dividing  the  land.  From 
where  Browning  lived  for  so  many  years  there  is 
an  aspect  which  might  well  have  reminded  him  of 
Venice.  The  canal  parts,  and  goes  two  ways, 
broadening  to  almost  a  lagoon,  where  trees  droop 
over  the  water  from  a  kind  of  island,  with  rocky 
houses  perched  on  it.  You  see  the  curve  of  a 
bridge,  formed  by  the  shadow  into  a  pure  circle, 
and  lighted  by  the  reflection  of  a  gas  lamp  in  the 
water  beyond ;  and  the  dim  road  opposite  following 
the  hne  of  the  canal,  might  be  a  calle ;  only  the  long 
hull  of  a  barge  lying  there  is  not  Venetian  in  shape, 
and,  decidedly,  the  atmosphere  is  not  Venetian. 
Verlaine,  not  knowing,  I  think,  that  Browning  lived 
there,  made  a  poem  about  the  canal,  which  he  dated 
"Paddington."  It  is  one  of  his  two  "Streets," 
and  it  begins:  "O  la  riviere  dans  la  rue,"  and 
goes  on  to  invoke  "I'eau  jaune  comme  une  morte," 
with  nothing  to  reflect  but  the  fog.  The  barges 
crawl  past  with  inexpressible  slowness ;  coming 
out  slowly  after  the  horse  and  the  rope  from  under 
the  bridge,  with  a  woman  leaning  motionless  against 
the  helm,  and  drifting  on  as  if  they  were  not  moving 
at  all. 

On  the  river  the  lights  are  always  at  work 
building  fairy-palaces;  wherever  there  are  trees 
they   wink   like   stars   through   drifting   cloud,    and 

2IO 


London. 

the  trees  become  oddly  alive,  with  a  more  restless 
life  than  their  hfe  by  day.  I  have  seen  a  plain 
churchyard  with  its  straight  grave-stones  turn  on 
a  winter  afternoon  into  a  sea  of  white  rocks,  with 
vague  rosy  shore  hghts  beyond.  But  it  is  the 
fog  which  lends  itself  to  the  supreme  London 
decoration,  collaborating  with  gaslight  through 
countless  transformations,  from  the  white  shroud 
to  the  yellow  blanket,  until  every  gas  lamp  is  out, 
and  you  cannot  see  a  torch  a  yard  beyond  your 
feet. 

There  is  nothing  in  the  world  quite  like  a  London 
fog,  though  the  underground  railway  stations  in 
the  days  of  steam  might  have  prepared  us  for  it 
and  Dante  has  described  it  in  the  "Inferno"  when 
he  speaks  of  the  banks  of  a  pit  in  hell,  "crusted 
over  with  a  mould  from  the  vapour  below,  which 
cakes  upon  them,  and  battles  with  eye  and  nose." 
Foreigners  praise  it  as  the  one  thing  in  which 
London  is  unique.  They  come  to  London  to 
experience  it.  It  is  as  if  one  tried  the  experience 
of  drowning  or  suffocating.  It  is  a  penalty  worse 
than  any  Chinese  penalty.  It  stifles  the  mind  as 
well  as  choking  the  body.  It  comes  on  slowly 
and  stealthily,  picking  its  way,  choosing  its  direc- 
tion, leaving  contemptuous  gaps  in  its  course; 
then  it  settles  down  like  a  blanket  of  sohd  smoke, 
which  you  can  feel  but  not  put  from  you.  The 
streets  turn  putrescent,  the  gas  lamps  hang  hke 
rotting  fruit,  you  are  in  a  dark  tunnel,  in  which 
the  Hghts   are  going  out,   and   beside  you,   unseen, 

211 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

there  is  a  roar  and  rumble,  interrupted  with  sharp 
cries,  a  stopping  of  wheels  and  a  beginning  of  the 
roar  and  rumble  over  again.  You  walk  like  a 
blind  man,  fumbling  with  his  staff  at  the  edge 
of  the  pavement.  FamiHar  turnings,  which  you 
fancied  you  could  follow  blindfold,  deceive  you, 
and  you  are  helpless  if  you  go  two  yards  out  of  your 
course.  The  grime  blackens  your  face,  your  eyes 
smart,  your  throat  is  as  if  choked  with  dust.  You 
breathe  black  foulness  and  it  enters  into  you  and 
contaminates  you. 

And  yet,  how  strange,  inexplicable,  mysteriously 
impressive  is  this  masque  of  shadows !  It  is  the 
one  wholly  complete  transformation  of  the  visible 
world,  the  one  darkness  which  is  really  visible, 
the  one  creation  of  at  least  the  beauty  of  horror 
which  has  been  made  by  dirt,  smoke,  and  cities. 

Yet  the  eternal  smoke  of  London  lies  in  wait 
for  us,  not  only  in  the  pestilence  of  chimneys,  but 
rising  violently  out  of  the  earth,  in  a  rhetoric  of  its 
own.  There  are  in  London  certain  gaps  or  holes 
in  the  earth,  which  are  hke  vent-holes,  and  out  of 
these  openings  its  inner  ferment  comes  for  a  moment 
to  the  surface.  One  of  them  is  at  Chalk  Farm 
Station.  There  is  a  gaunt  cavernous  doorway 
leading  underground,  and  this  doorway  faces  three 
roads  from  the  edge  of  a  bridge.  The  bridge 
crosses  an  abyss  of  steam,  which  rises  out  of  depths 
hke  the  depths  of  a  boihng  pot,  only  it  is  a  witches' 
pot  of  noise  and  fire;  and  pillars  and  pyramids 
of  smoke  rise  continually  out  of  it,   and  there  are 

212 


London. 

hoarse  cries,  screams,  a  clashing  and  rattHng,  the 
sound  as  of  a  movement  which  struggles  and  cannot 
escape,  like  the  coiling  of  serpents  twisting  together 
in  a  pit.  Their  breath  rises  in  clouds,  and  drifts 
voluminously  over  the  gap  of  the  abyss ;  catching 
at  times  a  ghastly  colour  from  the  lamphght.  Some- 
times one  of  the  snakes  seems  to  rise  and  sway  out 
of  the  tangle,  a  column  of  yellow  blackness.  Multi- 
tudes of  red  and  yellow  eyes  speckle  the  vague 
and  smoky  darkness,  out  of  which  rise  domes  and 
roofs  and  chimneys ;  and  a  few  astonished  trees 
lean  over  the  mouth  of  the  pit,  sucking  up  draughts 
of  smoke  for  air. 


213 


VI. 

Is  there  any  city  in  which  life  and  the  conditions 
of  Ufe  can  be  more  abject  than  in  London,  any  city 
in  which  the  poor  are  more  naturally  unhappy 
and  less  able  to  shake  off  or  come  through  their 
poverty  into  any  natural  rehef?  Those  sordid 
splendours  of  smoke  and  dirt  which  may  be  so  fine 
as  aspects,  mean  something  which  we  can  only 
express  by  the  English  word  squalor;  they  mean 
the  dishumanising  of  innumerable  people  who 
have  no  less  right  than  ourselves  to  exist  naturally. 
I  will  take  one  road,  which  I  know  well,  and  which 
every  one  who  lives  in  London  must  know  some- 
what, for  it  is  a  main  artery,  Edgware  Road,  as  a 
parable  of  what  I  mean.  Nowhere  in  London  is 
there  more  material  for  a  comparative  study  in 
living. 

Edgware  Road  begins  proudly  in  the  West 
End  of  London,  sweeping  off  in  an  emphatic 
curve  from  the  railings  of  Hyde  Park,  beyond  the 
Marble  Arch;  it  grows  meaner  before  Chapel 
Street,  and  from  Chapel  Street  to  the  flower-shanty 
by  the  canal,  where  Maida  Vale  goes  down  hill, 
it  seems  to  concentrate  into  itself  all  the  sordidness 
of  London.  Walking  outward  from  Chapel  Street, 
on  the  right-hand  side  of  the  road,  you  plunge 
instantly  into  a  dense,  parching,  and  envelopmg 
smell,  made  up  of  stale  fish,  rotting  vegetables, 
and  the  must  of  old  clothes.  The  pavement  is 
never  clean;  bits  of  torn  paper,  fragments  of 
cabbage  leaves,  the  rind  of  fruit,  the  stalks  of 
214 


London. 

flowers,  the  litter  swept  away  from  the  front  of  shops 
and  hngering  on  its  way  to  the  gutter,  drift  to  and 
fro  under  one's  feet,  moist  with  rain  or  greased 
with  mud.  As  one  steps  out  of  the  way  of  a  sHmy 
greyness  on  the  ground,  one  brushes  against  a 
coat  on  which  the  dirt  has  caked  or  a  skirt  which 
it  streaks  damply.  Women  in  shawls,  with  untidy 
hair,  turn  down  into  the  road  from  all  the  side 
streets,  and  go  in  and  out  of  the  shops.  They 
carry  baskets,  bags,  and  parcels  wrapped  in  news- 
papers ;  grease  oozes  through  the  paper,  smearing 
it  with  printer's  ink  as  it  melts.  They  push  per- 
ambulators in  front  of  them,  in  which  children  with 
smeared  faces  pitch  and  roll ;  they  carry  babies 
under  their  shawls.  Men  with  unshaven  faces, 
holding  short  clay  pipes  between  their  teeth,  walk 
shambhngly  at  their  side ;  the  men's  clothes  are 
discoloured  with  time  and  weather,  and  hang 
loosely  about  them,  as  if  they  had  been  bought 
ready-made ;  they  have  dirty  scarves  knotted  round 
their  necks,  and  they  go  along  without  speaking. 
Men  with  thread-bare  frock  coats,  ill-fitting  and 
carefully  brushed,  pass  nervously,  with  white  faces 
and  thin  fingers.  Heavy  men  with  whips  in  their 
hands,  thin,  clean-shaven  men  in  short  coats  and 
riding  gaiters,  lounge  in  front  of  the  horse-dealer's 
across  the  road,  or  outside  dusty  shops  with  bundles 
of  hay  and  sacks  of  bran  in  their  doorways. 

Here  and  there  a  gaudy  sheet  slung  across  a 
window  announces  a  fat  woman  on  show,  or  a 
collection    of   waxworks    with    the    latest    murder ; 

215 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

flags  and  streamers,  daubed  with  ragged  lettering, 
hang  out  from  the  upper  windows.  At  intervals, 
along  the  pavement,  there  are  girls  offering  big 
bunches  of  white  and  yellow  flowers ;  up  the  side 
streets  there  are  barrows  of  plants  and  ferns  and 
flowers  in  pots ;  and  the  very  odour  of  the  flowers 
turns  sickly,  as  the  infection  of  the  air  sucks  it  up 
and  mingles  it  with  the  breath  and  sweat  of  the 
people  and  the  ancient  reek  of  clothes  that  have 
grown  old  upon  unwashed  bodies. 

Sometimes  a  pavement  artist  brings  his  pictures 
with  him  on  a  square  canvas,  and  ties  a  string  in 
front  of  them,  propping  them  against  the  wall,  and 
sits  on  the  ground  at  one  end,  with  his  cap  in  his 
hand.  At  regular  intervals  a  Punch  and  Judy 
comes  to  one  of  the  side  streets,  just  in  from  the 
road,  a  little  melancholy  white  dog  with  a  red  ruff 
about  its  neck  barks  feebly  as  the  puppets  flap  their 
noses  in  its  face.  On  Sundays  the  Salvation  Army 
holds  meetings,  with  flags  flying  and  loud  brass 
instruments  playing;  the  red  caps  and  black  sun- 
bonnets  can  be  seen  in  the  hollow  midst  of  the 
crowd.  Not  far  off,  men  dressed  in  surplices 
stand  beside  a  harmonium,  with  prayer-books  in 
their  hands ;  a  few  people  listen  to  them  half- 
heartedly. There  are  generally  one  or  two  Italian 
women,  with  bright  green  birds  in  their  cages, 
huddled  in  the  corner  of  doorways  and  arches, 
waiting  to  tell  fortunes.  A  blind  beggar  in  a  tall 
hat  stands  at  the  edge  of  the  curbstone;  he  has 
a  tray  of  matches  and  boot-laces  to  sell ;  he  holds 
216 


London. 

a  stick  in  his  hand,  with  which  he  paws  nervously 
at  an  inch  of  pavement ;  his  heel  seeks  the  gutter, 
and  feels  its  way  up  and  down  from  gutter  to 
pavement. 

Somewhere  along  the  road  there  is  generally 
a  little  crowd ;  a  horse  has  fallen,  or  a  woman  has 
lost  a  penny  in  the  mud,  or  a  policeman,  note-book 
in  hand,  is  talking  to  a  cab-driver  who  has  upset 
a  bicycle.  Two  women  are  quarrelling ;  they 
tear  at  the  handle  of  a  perambulator  in  which  two 
babies  sit  and  smile  cheerfully.  Two  men  grapple 
with  each  other  in  the  middle  of  the  road,  almost 
under  the  horses  of  the  omnibus ;  the  driver  stops 
his  horses,  so  as  not  to  run  them  down.  A  coarse, 
red-faced  woman  of  fifty  drags  an  old  woman  by 
the  arm ;  she  is  almost  too  old  to  walk,  and  she 
totters  and  spreads  out  her  arms  helplessly  as  the 
other  pulls  at  her;  her  head  turns  on  her  shoulder, 
looking  out  blindly,  the  mouth  falling  open  in  a 
convulsive  grimace,  the  whole  face  eaten  away 
with  some  obscure  suffering  which  she  is  almost 
past  feeling.  A  barrel-organ  plays  violently ;  some 
youths  stare  at  the  picture  of  the  fat,  half-naked 
lady  on  the  front  of  the  instrument ;  one  or  two 
children  hold  out  their  skirts  in  both  hands  and 
begin  to  dance  to  the  tune. 

On  Saturday  night  the  Road  is  lined  with  stalls; 
naphtha  flames  burn  over  every  stall,  flaring  away 
from  the  wind,  and  hghting  up  the  faces  that  lean 
towards  them  from  the  crowd  on  the  pavement. 
There  are  stalls  with  plants,  cheap  jewelry,  paper 

217 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

books,  scarves  and  braces,  sweets,  bananas,  ice- 
cream barrows,  weighing-machines;  long  rows  of 
rabbits  hang  by  their  trussed  hind  legs,  and  a  boy 
skins  them  rapidly  with  a  pen-knife  for  the  buyers ; 
raw  lumps  of  meat  redden  and  whiten  as  the  hght 
drifts  over  and  away  from  them;  the  salesmen 
cry  their  wares.  The  shops  blaze  with  hght,  dis- 
playing their  cheap  clothes  and  cheap  furniture 
and  clusters  of  cheap  boots.  Some  of  the  women 
are  doing  their  Saturday  night's  shopping,  but  for 
the  most  part  it  is  a  holiday  night,  and  the  people 
swarm  in  the  streets,  some  in  their  working  clothes, 
some  in  the  finery  which  they  will  put  on  to-morrow 
for  their  Sunday  afternoon  walk  in  the  Park;  in 
their  faces,  their  movements,  there  is  that  un- 
enjoying  hilarity  which  the  end  of  the  week's  work, 
the  night,  the  week's  wages,  the  sort  of  street  fair 
at  which  one  can  buy  things  to  eat  and  to  put  on, 
bring  out  in  people  who  seem  to  hve  for  the  most 
part  with  preoccupied  indifference. 

As  I  walk  to  and  fro  in  Edgware  Road,  I  cannot 
help  sometimes  wondering  why  these  people  exist, 
why  they  take  the  trouble  to  go  on  existing.  Watch 
their  faces,  and  you  will  see  in  them  a  listlessness, 
a  hard  unconcern,  a  failure  to  be  interested,  which 
speaks  equally  in  the  roving  eyes  of  the  man  who 
stands  smoking  at  the  curbstone  with  his  hands  in 
his  pockets,  and  in  the  puckered  cheeks  of  the 
woman  doing  her  shopping,  and  in  the  noisy  laugh 
of  the  youth  leaning  against  the  wall,  and  in  the 
grey,  narrow  face  of  the  child  whose  thin  legs  are 
218 


Lond 


on. 


too  tired  to  dance  when  the  barrel-organ  plays  jigs. 
Whenever  anything  happens  in  the  streets  there  is 
a  crowd  at  once,  and  this  crowd  is  made  up  of 
people  who  have  no  pleasures  and  no  interests  of 
their  own  to  attend  to,  and  to  whom  any  variety 
is  welcome  in  the  tedium  of  their  lives.  In  all 
these  faces  you  will  see  no  beauty,  and  you  will 
see  no  beauty  in  the  clothes  they  wear,  or  in  their 
attitudes  in  rest  or  movement,  or  in  their  voices 
when  they  speak.  They  are  human  beings  to  whom 
nature  has  given  no  grace  or  charm,  whom  life  has 
made  vulgar,  and  for  whom  circumstances  have 
left  no  escape  from  themselves.  In  the  climate 
of  England,  in  the  atmosphere  of  London,  on  these 
pavements  of  Edgware  Road,  there  is  no  way  of 
getting  any  simple  happiness  out  of  natural  things, 
and  they  have  lost  the  capacity  for  accepting  natural 
pleasures  graciously,  if  such  came  to  them.  Crawl- 
ing between  heaven  and  earth  thus  miserably,  they 
have  never  known  what  makes  existence  a  practicable 
art  or  a  tolerable  spectacle,  and  they  have  infinitely 
less  sense  of  the  mere  abstract  human  significance 
of  life  than  the  facchino  who  lies,  a  long  blue  streak 
in  the  sun,  on  the  Zattere  at  Venice,  or  the  girl 
who  carries  water  from  the  well  in  an  earthen  pitcher, 
balancing  it  on  her  head,  in  any  Spanish  street. 

Or,  instead  of  turning  to  human  beings,  in  some 
more  favourable  part  of  the  world,  go  to  the  Zoo- 
logical Gardens  and  look  at  the  beasts  there.  The 
conditions  of  existence  are,  perhaps,  slightly  worse 
for  the  beasts  ;  their  cages  are  narrow,  more  securely 

219 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

barred ;  human  curiosity  is  brought  to  bear  upon 
them  with  a  more  pubUc  offence.  But  observe, 
under  all  these  conditions,  the  dignity  of  the  beasts, 
their  disdain,  their  indifference !  When  the  flutter- 
ing beribboned,  chattering  human  herd  troops  past 
them,  pointing  at  them  with  shrill  laughter,  uneasy, 
preoccupied,  one  eye  on  the  beasts  and  the  other 
on  the  neighbour's  face  or  frock,  they  sit  there 
stolidly  in  their  cages,  not  condescending  to  notice 
their  unruly  critics.  When  they  move,  they  move 
with  the  grace  of  natural  things,  made  rhythmical 
with  beauty  and  strong  for  ravage  and  swift  for 
flight.  They  pace  to  and  fro,  rubbing  themselves 
against  the  bars,  restlessly ;  but  they  seem  all  on 
fire  with  a  life  that  tingles  to  the  roots  of  their  claws 
and  to  the  tips  of  their  tails,  dilating  their  nostrils 
and  quivering  in  little  shudders  down  their  smooth 
flanks.  They  have  found  an  enemy  craftier  than 
they,  they  have  been  conquered  and  carried  away 
captive,  and  they  are  full  of  smouldering  rage. 
But  with  the  loss  of  liberty  they  have  lost  nothing 
of  themselves ;  the  soul  of  their  flesh  is  uncon- 
taminated  by  humiliation.  They  pass  a  mournful 
existence  nobly,  each  after  his  kind,  in  loneliness 
or  in  unwilling  companionship ;  their  eyes  look 
past  us  without  seeing  us  ;  we  have  no  power  over 
their  concentration  within  the  muscles  of  their 
vivid  limbs  or  within  the  coils  of  their  subtle  bodies. 
Humanity,  at  the  best,  has  much  to  be  ashamed 
of,  physically,  beside  the  supreme  physical  perfection 
of  the  panther  or  the  snake.  All  of  us  look  poor 
220 


London. 

enough  creatures  as  we  come  away  from  their  cages. 
But  think  now  of  these  men  and  women  whom  we 
have  seen  swarming  in  Edgware  Road,  of  their 
vulgarity,  their  abjectness  of  attitude  toward  hfe, 
their  ughness,  dirt,  insolence,  their  loud  laughter. 
All  the  animals  except  man  have  too  much  dignity 
to  laugh;  only  man  found  out  the  way  to  escape 
the  direct  force  of  things  by  attaching  a  critical 
sense,  or  a  sense  of  rehef,  to  a  sound  which  is  neither 
a  cackle  nor  a  whinny,  but  which  has  something 
of  those  two  inarticulate  voices  of  nature.  As  I 
passed  through  the  Saturday  night  crowd  lately, 
between  two  opposing  currents  of  evil  smells,  I 
overheard  a  man  who  was  lurching  along  the 
pavement  say  in  contemptuous  comment:  "Twelve 
o'clock!  we  may  be  all  dead  by  twelve  o'clock!" 
He  seemed  to  sum  up  the  philosophy  of  that  crowd, 
its  listlessness,  its  hard  unconcern,  its  failure  to  be 
interested.  Nothing  matters,  he  seemed  to  say 
for  them ;  let  us  drag  out  our  time  until  the  time 
is  over,  and  the  sooner  it  is  over  the  better. 

Life  in  great  cities  dishumanises  humanity; 
it  envelops  the  rich  in  multitudes  of  clogging, 
costly  trifles,  and  cakes  the  poor  about  with  ignoble 
dirt  and  the  cares  of  unfruitful  labour.  Go  into 
the  country,  where  progress  and  machines  and 
other  gifts  of  the  twentieth  century  have  not  wholly 
taken  away  the  peasant's  hand  from  the  spade  and 
plough,  or  to  any  fishing  village  on  the  coast,  and 
you  will  see  that  poverty,  even  in  England,  can 
find  some  natural  deUghts  in  natural  things.     You 

221 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

will  find,  often  enough,  that  very  English  quaHty 
of  vulgarity  in  the  peasant  who  lives  inland  ;  only 
the  sea  seems  to  cleanse  vulgarity  out  of  the  English 
peasant,  and  to  brace  him  into  a  really  simple  and 
refined  dignity.  And,  after  all,  though  the  labourer 
who  turns  the  soil  is  in  unceasing  contact  with 
nature,  he  has  not  that  sting  of  danger  to  waken 
him  and  cultivate  his  senses  which  is  never  absent 
for  long  from  the  life  of  the  fisherman.  People  who 
cast  their  nets  into  the  sea,  on  the  hazard  of  that 
more  uncertain  harvest,  have  a  gravity,  a  finished 
self-reliance,  a  kind  of  philosophy  of  their  own. 
Their  eyes  and  hands  are  trained  to  fineness  and 
strength,  they  learn  to  know  the  winds  and  clouds, 
and  they  measure  their  wits  against  them,  risking 
their  lives  on  the  surety  of  their  calculations.  The 
constant  neighbourhood  of  death  gives  life  a  keener 
savour,  they  have  no  certainty  of  ever  opening 
again  the  door  which  they  close  behind  them  as 
they  go  out  to  launch  their  boats  under  the  stars. 
Tossing  between  a  naked  sea  and  a  naked  sky  all 
night  long,  they  have  leisure  for  many  dreams,  and 
thoughts  come  into  their  heads  which  never  trouble 
the  people  who  live  in  streets.  They  have  all  the 
visible  horizon  for  their  own. 

And  the  sea  washes  clean.  In  the  steep  Cornish 
village  that  I  know  best,  I  see,  whenever  I  go  out, 
bright  flowers  in  front  of  white  cottages,  a  cow's 
head  laid  quietly  over  a  stone  hedge,  looking  down 
on  the  road,  the  brown  harvest  in  the  fields  that 
stretch  away  beyond  the  trees  to  the  edge  of  the 

222 


London. 

cliff,  and  then,  further  on  towards  the  sky,  the  blue 
glitter  of  the  sea,  shining  under  sunlight,  with  great 
hills  and  palaces  of  white  clouds,  rising  up  from 
the  water  as  from  a  solid  foundation.  The  sea  is 
always  at  the  road's  end,  and  there  is  always  a  wind 
from  the  sea,  coming  singing  up  the  long  street 
from  the  harbour,  and  shouting  across  the  fields 
and  whistling  in  the  lanes.  Life  itself  seems  to 
come  freshly  into  one's  blood,  as  if  life  were  not 
only  a  going  on  with  one's  habits  and  occupations, 
but  itself  meant  something,  actually  existed.  Every 
one  I  meet  on  the  road  speaks  to  me  as  I  pass ; 
their  faces  and  their  voices  are  cheerful;  they  have 
no  curiosity,  but  they  are  ready  to  welcome  a  stranger 
as  if  he  were  some  one  they  knew  already.  Time 
seems  to  pass  easily,  in  each  day's  space  between 
sea  and  sky ;  the  day  has  no  tedium  for  them ; 
and  they  need  go  no  further  than  to  the  harbour 
or  the  farm  for  enough  interest  to  fill  out  all  the 
hours  of  the  day.  They  have  room  to  live,  air  to 
breathe ;  beauty  is  natural  to  everything  about 
them.  The  dates  in  their  churchyards  tell  you 
how  long  they  have  the  patience  to  go  on  living. 

1908, 


223 


III. 

Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 


Dieppe,   1895. 


I. 

I  WENT  to  Dieppe  this  summer  with  the  intention 
of  staying  from  Saturday  to  Monday.  Two  months 
afterwards  I  began  to  wonder,  with  a  very  mild 
kind  of  surprise,  why  I  had  not  yet  returned  to 
London.  And  I  was  not  the  only  one  to  fall  under 
this  inexplicable  fascination.  There  is  a  fantastical 
quality  in  Dieppe  air  which  somehow  turns  us  all, 
at  our  moments,  into  amiable  and  enthusiastic 
lunatics.  Relays  of  friends  kept  arriving,  I  as  little 
as  they  knew  why ;  and  some  of  them,  like  myself, 
never  went  back.  Others,  forced  to  live  mostly 
in  London,  and  for  the  most  part  content  to  live 
there,  went  backwards  and  forwards  every  week. 
What  is  it,  in  this  little  French  watering-place,  that 
appeals  so  to  the  not  quite  conventional  English- 
man, brings  him  to  it,  holds  him  in  it,  brings  him 
back  to  it  so  inevitably  ?  Nothing  and  everything ; 
an  impalpable  charm,  the  old-fashioned  distinction 
of  a  Httle  town  which  has  still,  in  its  faded  lawns 
by  the  sea,  in  the  hne  of  white  hotels  beyond  the 
lawns,  something  of  that  1830  air  which  exhales 
for  us  from  a  picture  of  Bonington.  And  then 
Dieppe  is  so  discreetly,  and  with  such  self-respect, 
hospitable  to  us  English ;  so  different  from  the 
vulgar  friendliness  of  Boulogne,  with  its  "English 
chop-houses"  insulting  one's  taste  at  every  step. 
Dieppe  receives  us  with  perfectly  French  manners, 
offers  us  politeness,  and  exacts  it  on  our  part,  and 
pleases    a    sensitive    and    appreciative    Englishman 

227 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

because  it  is  so  charming  in  such  a  French  way. 
And  then  hfe,  if  you  will  but  abandon  yourself  to 
the  natural  current  of  things,  passes  in  a  dream. 
I  do  not  quite  know  why,  but  one  cannot  take  things 
seriously  at  Dieppe.  Only  just  on  the  other  side 
of  that  blue  streak  is  England :  England  means 
London.  At  the  other  end  of  a  short  railway-line 
is  Paris.  But  all  that  is  merely  so  many  words ; 
the  mind  refuses  to  grasp  it  as  a  fact.  One's  duties, 
probably,  call  one  to  London  or  Paris,  one's  realisable 
pleasures ;  everything  but  the  moment's  vague 
immense,  I  say  again,  inexplicable,  satisfaction, 
which  broods  and  dawdles  about  Dieppe. 

At  Dieppe  the  sea  is  liberal,  and  affords  you  a 
long  sweep  from  the  cliffs  on  the  left  to  the  pier  on 
the  right.  A  few  villas  nestle  under  the  cliffs ; 
then  comes  the  Casino,  which  takes  its  slice  of  the 
plage  with  excellent  judgment.  Built  of  peppermint- 
coloured  brick,  it  sprawls  its  length  insolently  above 
the  sea.  It  is  quite  nice,  as  casinos  go ;  it  is  roomy, 
and  has  some  amusing  chandeliers  hung  up  by 
ribbons ;  and  the  terrace  is  absolutely  charming. 
If  you  are  insular  enough  to  wish  it,  you  can  sit  and 
drink  brandies  and  sodas  all  day;  if  you  would  do 
in  France  as  the  French  do,  you  can  sit  nearer  the 
parapet,  with  an  awning  stretched  above  your  head, 
and  look  out  drowsily  over  the  sea,  which  is  worth 
looking  at  here,  opalescent,  full  of  soft  change. 
You  will  see  around  you  beautiful,  well-dressed 
women,  princes,  painters,  poets,  Cleo  de  Merode. 
All  around  you,  bright  in  the  bright  sun,  there  is 
228 


Dieppe,  1895. 

a  flow  of  soft  dresses,  mostly  in  sharp,  clear  colours, 
vivid  yellows  and  blues  and  whites,  the  most  wonder- 
ful blues,  more  dazzHng  than  the  sea.  And  there 
are  delicious  hats,  floating  over  the  hair  like  clouds; 
great  floating  sleeves,  adding  wings  to  the  butter- 
fly; all  the  fashions  and  fehcities  of  a  whole 
summer. 

Ah  !  but  the  plage,  on  a  sunny  morning  in  mid- 
season,  what  a  feast  of  colour,  of  movement,  of  the 
most  various  curiosities  !  The  plage  has  its  social 
laws,  its  social  divisions,  an  etiquette  almost  as 
scrupulous  as  a  drawing-room.  All  the  space  in 
front  of  the  Casino  is  tacitly  reserved  for  the  people 
who  subscribe  to  the  Casino,  and  who  are  moving 
up  and  down  the  wooden  staircase  from  the  terrace 
to  the  beach  all  day  long.  Beyond  that  limit  the 
plage  is  plebeian,  and  belongs  to  everybody.  Women 
sit  about  there  with  shawls  and  babies  and  paper 
parcels.  Outside  the  Casino  there  are  fewer  people, 
but  one  is  more  or  less  smart,  and  the  barons  and 
beautes  de  plage  are  alike  here.  In  front  of  the 
double  row  of  bathing-machines  there  is  a  line  of 
little  private  boxes.  Smart  women  sit  on  exhibition 
in  every  compartment,  wearing  their  best  hats  and 
smiles,  sometimes  pretending  to  read  or  sew,  as  if 
one  did  anything  but  sit  on  exhibition,  and  flirt, 
and  chatter,  and  look  at  the  bathers !  There  is 
a  constant  promenade  along  the  shifting  and  re- 
sounding pathway  of  boards  laid  over  the  great 
pebbles ;  chairs  are  grouped  closely  all  along  the 
plage  between  this  promenade  and  the  sea ;    there 

229 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

is  another  little  crowd  on  the  estacade,  from  which 
the  bathers  are  diving.  The  bright  dresses  glitter 
in  the  sunHght,  like  a  flower  garden ;  white  peignoirs^ 
bright  and  dark  bathing  costumes,  the  white  and 
rose  of  bare  and  streaming  flesh,  passing  to  and  fro, 
hurriedly,  between  the  bathing-machines  and  the 
sea.  The  men,  if  they  have  good  figures,  look 
well;  they  have  at  least  the  chance  of  looking 
well.  But  the  women !  Rare,  indeed,  is  the 
woman  who  can  look  pretty,  in  her  toilette  or  her- 
self, as  she  comes  out  of  the  sea,  wraps  herself  in 
a  sort  of  white  nightgown,  and  staggers  up  the 
beach,  the  water  running  down  her  legs.  Even 
at  the  more  elegant  moment  when  she  drops  her 
peignoir  at  the  sea's  edge,  before  stepping  in,  it  is 
hard  for  her  to  look  her  best.  Is  it  not  with  a  finer 
taste,  after  all,  that  in  some  parts  of  England  the 
women  are  not  allowed  to  bathe  with  the  men,  are 
kept  out  of  sight  as  much  as  possible  ?  A  senti- 
mental sensualist  should  avoid  the  French  seaside. 
He  will  be  pained  at  seeing  how  ridiculous  a  beauti- 
ful woman  may  look  when  she  is  clothed  in  wet 
and  dragging  garments.  The  lines  of  the  body  are 
lost  or  deformed  ;  there  is  none  of  the  suggestion 
of  ordinary  costume,  only  a  grotesque  and  shapeless 
image,  all  in  pits  and  protuberances  for  which 
Nature  should  be  ashamed  to  accept  responsibility. 
Between  nakedness  and  this  compromise  with 
clothes  there  is  the  whole  world's  length  ;  and  as 
for  this  state  of  being  undressed  and  yet  covered, 
in  this  makeshift,  unmilliner-like  way,  it  is  too 
230 


Dieppe,  1895. 

barbarous,    Mesdames,    for    the    tolerance    of   any 
gentleman  of  taste. 

II. 

The  Casino  has  many  charms.  You  can  dance 
there,  listen  to  music,  walk  or  sit  on  the  terrace  in 
the  sun,  write  your  letters  in  the  reading-room  on 
the  very  pictorial  paper  which  is  so  carefully  doled 
out  to  you ;  but  it  is  for  none  of  these  things  that 
the  Casino  exists,  it  is  in  none  of  these  things  that 
there  hes  the  unique  fascination  of  the  Casino,  for 
those  to  whom  the  Casino  has  a  unique  fascination. 
The  Casino,  properly  speaking,  is  only  a  gorgeous 
stable  for  the  little  horses.  All  the  rooms  in  the 
Casino  open  into  the  room  of  the  green  tables ; 
all  the  alleys  of  the  gardens  lead  there.  In  the 
intervals  of  the  concert,  if  you  wish  to  stroll  for  a 
few  minutes  on  the  terrace,  you  have  to  pass  through 
the  room ;  you  see  the  avid  circle  about  the  tables, 
hear  the  swish  of  the  horses,  the  monotonous 
"Faites  vos  jeux.  Messieurs.  .  .  .  Les  jeux  sont 
faits.  .  .  .  Rien  ne  va  plus,"  and  then,  after  the 
expectant  pause,  the  number:  "L'as,  numero 
un."  And  in  time,  however  strong,  or  however 
idle,  or  however  indifferent  you  are,  you  will  be 
drawn  into  that  fascinated  circle,  you  will  be  seized 
by  the  irresistible  impulse,  you  will  begin  to  play. 
The  fascination  of  gambling,  to  the  real  amateur 
of  the  thing,  is  stronger  than  any  other  passion. 
Men  forget  that  a  beautiful  woman  is  sitting  opposite 

231 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

to  them ;  women  do  not  so  much  as  notice  that  a 
more  beautiful  toilette  than  their  own  has  just  come 
into  the  room.  I  have  seen  the  most  famous  pro- 
fessional beauties  of  Paris  sit  at  those  green  tables, 
and  not  a  soul  has  looked  at  them  except  the  croupiers 
and  myself. 

I  said  the  impulse  was  irresistible.  I  have  proved 
it  on  myself.  Gambhng  in  the  abstract  has  no 
charms  for  me ;  I  can  go  to  the  races  without  the 
slightest  inclination  to  take  the  odds ;  it  annoys 
me  when  little  newspaper  boys  rush  up  to  me  as 
if  expecting  me  to  buy  their  papers  because  they  are 
the  first  to  shout  "All  the  win-ner!"  I  lounged 
about  the  room  of  the  Petits  Chevaux  for  weeks 
without  putting  on  more  than  two  or  three  two- 
franc  pieces,  which  I  contentedly  lost.  I  saw  my 
friends  winning  and  losing  every  afternoon  and 
every  evening;  I  saw  them  leaving  the  tables  with 
their  pockets  bulging  with  five-franc  pieces ;  I 
heard  them  discussing  lucky  numbers ;  I  saw  the 
strength  of  the  passion  which  held  them  by  the 
urgency  and  the  futility  of  their  remorse  when  they 
had  lost;  I  heard  them  saying  to  me,  "It  will  be 
your  turn  next,"  and  I  laughed,  certain  of  myself. 
At  last  a  woman,  with  a  malicious  confidence, 
tempted  me.  I  put  on  a  few  francs  to  please  her, 
and  I  found  myself  waiting  with  more  interest  for 
the  turn  of  her  head  than  for  the  gesture  of  the  little 
horse  who  passed  the  winning  post  first.  I  knew 
by  that  that  the  demon  of  play  had  not  bitten  me ; 
I  felt  absolutely  safe. 
232 


Dieppe,  1895. 

Well,  of  course,  I  succumbed,  and  the  sensation 
I  experienced  was  worth  the  price  I  paid  for  it. 
While  I  played  nothing  existed  but  the  play ;  the 
money  slipped  through  my  fingers,  I  gathered  it 
in,  flung  it  forth,  with  an  absorption  so  complete 
that  my  actions  were  almost  mechanical.  My 
brain  seemed  to  act  with  instantaneous  energy ; 
no  sooner  had  I  willed  than  my  fingers  were  placing 
the  coins  here,  and  not  there,  I  knew  not  why, 
on  the  table.  I  followed  no  system,  and  I  never 
hesitated.  I  then  knew  for  the  first  time  the  strength 
of  conviction  for  which  there  is  not  even  the  pretence 
of  a  foundation.  While  my  money  lasted,  and  I 
saw  it  flowing  to  me  and  from  me  so  capriciously,  I 
felt  what  I  think  must  have  been  the  intoxication 
of  abandoning  oneself  to  Fate,  with  an  astonishing 
sense  of  superiority  over  ordinary  mortals,  from 
whom  I  was  almost  more  absolutely  removed  than 
if  I  had  been  moving  in  a  haschisch  dream.  And 
in  the  exaltation,  the  absorption  of  this  dream, 
in  which  I  was  acting  with  such  reckless  and  cause- 
less certainty,  there  was  no  really  disillusioning 
shock,  either  when  I  lost  or  when  I  won.  My 
excitement  was  so  great  that  I  accepted  these 
accidents  as  merely  points  in  a  progress.  After 
a  time  I  did  not  even  play  for  the  sake  of  winning. 
I  played  for  the  sake  of  playing. 

After  all,  Petits  Chevaux  is  the  merest  amateur 
gambling;  the  serious  people  who  play  baccarat 
next  door,  in  the  club,  would  laugh  at  it,  and 
rightly,    from   the   gambler's    point   of  view.     The 

233 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

interest  of  the  thing  is  in  its  revelation  of  the  universal 
humanity  of  the  gambling  instinct,  which  comes 
out  so  certainly  and  so  unexpectedly  in  the  people 
who  gamble  once  in  the  year,  for  a  few  scores  or  a 
few  hundreds  of  francs.  And  those  green  tables 
are  so  admirable  in  the  view  they  afford  of  the  httle 
superstitions  which  exist  somewhere  in  the  back- 
ground of  all  minds.  This  table  is  lucky  to  such  a 
person,  that  column  to  another.  The  women  swear 
by  the  croupiers,  and  will  take  any  amount  of  trouble 
to  get  a  seat  by  the  side  of  the  one  they  prefer. 
And  the  croupiers,  little  miserable  engines  of  Fate, 
sit  with  folded  hands  and  intent  eyes,  impassive, 
supercilious,  like  Httle  Eastern  gods,  raking  in  the 
money  without  satisfaction,  and  tossing  you  your 
winnings  with  an  air  of  disdain.  Yet  they,  too, 
in  spite  of  their  air  of  supremacy,  are  entirely  at 
the  mercy  of  a  moment's  caprice.  They  may  be 
dismissed  if  you  win  too  much  at  their  table ;  and 
here  is  the  most  imposing  of  all  the  croupiers  offering 
himself  and  his  wife,  as  servants,  to  a  lady  who 
played  there. 

III. 

On  certain  afternoons  there  is  a  Bal  des  Enfants 
at  the  Casino.  You  cannot  imagine  anything  more 
delicious.  All  around  the  room  sit  children,  in 
their  white  dresses,  their  little,  thin  black  and 
yellow  legs  set  forth  gravely.  They  are  preoccupied 
with    their    fans,    their   sashes,    their   gloves;     their 

234 


Dieppe,  1895. 

hair  is  beautifully  done  all  over  their  heads,  and 
falls  down  their  backs.  The  little  boys,  in  velvet 
and  navy  suits,  march  to  and  fro,  very  solemnly, 
a  little  awkwardly,  bow,  and  choose  partners.  The 
bigger  girls  (some  of  them  are  thirteen  or  fourteen) 
jump  up,  cross  the  room  hurriedly,  with  the  nervous 
movement  of  young  girls  walking,  tossing  their 
hair  back  from  their  shoulders ;  they  form  little 
groups,  laugh  and  nod  to  the  grown-up  people 
who  stand  about  the  door;  and  every  now  and 
then  pounce  on  a  tiny  sister,  and  pull  about  her 
dress  until  its  set  suits  them.  In  the  middle  of 
the  room  stand  two  absurd  persons ;  the  blond 
Jew  with  the  immense  pink  nose,  the  golden  beard 
and  moustaches,  who  acts  as  master  of  the  cere- 
monies :  he  tries  to  assume  a  paternal  air,  his  swollen 
eyes  dart  about  nervously;  and  the  middle-aged 
lady  with  the  eyeglasses,  who  is  more  immediately 
concerned  with  the  children's  conduct.  She  is 
frankly  anxious,  fussy,  and  occupied.  The  or- 
chestra is  about  to  begin,  and  in  the  middle  of  the 
room  a  httle  helpless  ring  of  very  tiny  children, 
infants,  begins  to  walk  gravely  round  and  round ; 
the  tiny  people  hold  one  another's  hands,  wonder- 
ingly,  and  toddle  along  with  their  heads  looking 
over  their  shoulders,  all  in  opposite  directions. 
The  dance  has  begun :  it  is  the  Moska,  with  its 
funny  rhythm,  its  double  stamp  of  the  heels.  Some 
of  the  children  dance  charmingly,  with  a  pretty 
exactness  in  the  trip  and  turn  of  the  toes,  the  fling 
of  the  leg.     There  are  adorable  frocks,  marvellous 

235 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

faces.  They  turn,  turn,  stop  short,  stamp  their 
heels,  and  turn  again.  The  whole  thing  is  so  gay 
and  simple  and  artificial,  these  little,  got-up  people 
who  are  playing  at  being  their  elders ;  it  is  so  pretty 
altogether  and  so  exciting,  that  I  could  watch  it 
for  hours.  Nothing  is  more  exciting  than  to  see 
children  masquerading.  I  am  always  disposed  to 
take  them,  as  they  would  be  taken,  very  seriously, 
to  think  of  them  almost  as  of  men  and  women. 
As  if  they  were  not  so  far  more  attractive  than  any 
possible  men  and  women  !  I  hate  to  think  of  all 
that  floating  hair  being  twisted  up  into  coils  and 
bundled  together  obscurely  at  the  back  of  the  head. 
I  can  see  the  elder  sisters  of  these  enchanting  little 
absurdities  standing  beside  me  at  the  door.  How 
uninteresting  they  are,  how  little  they  invite  the 
wandering  of  even  the  vaguest  emotion ! 

IV. 

But  all  Dieppe  is  not  to  be  seen  at  the  Casino, 
and,  perhaps,  not  the  most  intimate  part  of  Dieppe. 
I  had  the  good  fortune  to  live  in  the  very  heart 
of  the  town,  just  outside  the  principal  doorway  of 
the  Eglise  Saint-Jacques.  I  have  never  in  my  life 
had  a  more  genuine  and,  in  its  way,  profound 
sensation  than  my  daily  and  nightly  view  of  that 
adorable  old  church,  a  somewhat  flamboyant  Gothic, 
certainly,  which  I  grew  to  love  and  wonder  at  with 
an  intimacy  that  was  entirely  new  to  me.  To 
look  out  last  thing  at  night,  before  getting  into  bed, 
236 


Dieppe,  1895. 

and  see  the  grey  stone  flowering  there  before  me, 
rising  up  into  the  stars  as  if  at  home  there,  and  so 
full  of  soUd  shadow  about  its  base,  broadly  planted 
on  the  solid  earth ;  to  rise  in  the  morning  and  look 
out  on  the  same  grey  mass,  white  in  parts,  and 
warm  in  the  early  sunlight;  there  never  was  a 
decor  which  pleased  me  so  much,  which  put  so  many 
dreams  into  my  head.  Every  Gothic  church  is  a 
nest  of  dreams,  and  the  least  rehgiously  minded 
of  men  has  his  moments  of  devotion,  of  spiritual 
exaltation  before  so  delicate  and  so  enduring  a 
work  of  men's  hands  in  praise  of  God.  Sight  and 
thought  are  lost  in  it;  one  feels  its  immensity  as 
one  feels  the  immensity  of  the  sea.  And  it  was 
as  dear  to  me  as  the  sea  itself,  this  church  of  the 
patron  saint  of  fishermen,  who  leans  upon  his 
staff",  a  sensual  Jewish  person  with  fleshy  Hps  and 
a  smile  which  is  somewhat  sneering  in  the  arch  of 
the  doorway. 

During  the  first  part  of  my  stay,  the  fineness, 
the  supremacy,  the  air  of  eternity  of  the  church  were 
curiously  accentuated  by  a  little  fair,  horrid,  an 
oppression,  a  nightmare,  which  installed  itself  at 
the  church's  very  base,  in  every  corner  of  the  many- 
cornered  ground  about  it.  All  day  long,  into  the 
late  evening,  the  wooden  horses  went  swaying 
round  to  the  noise  of  two  or  three  tunes ;  a  trans- 
formation show  of  Joan  of  Arc,  just  below  my 
window,  had  a  drum  and  a  cornet  at  the  door;  a 
peep-show  had  a  piano,  and  shots  were  fired  all  day 
long   in   the   "Tir   des   Salons,"   next   door   to   the 

237 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

"Theatre  Moderne,"  which  had  a  small  band. 
Then,  all  around,  clinging  still  closer  to  the  skirts  ' 
of  the  church,  were  caravans  and  tents,  in  which 
all  these  motley  people  lived  and  slept  and  did  their 
cooking.  They  swarmed  about  it  Hke  a  crowd  of 
insects,  throwing  up  their  little  mounds  in  the 
earth;  and  the  church  rose  calmly,  undisturbed, 
almost  unconscious  of  the  very  existence  of  the 
swarm,  as  the  Eternal  Church  rises  out  of  the  agita- 
tions and  feverish  coming-and-going  of  the  world 
and  the  fashions  of  the  world. 

V. 

Very  characteristic  of  Dieppe,  I  thought,  and 
certainly  quite  unlike  anything  you  can  see  in 
England,  is  the  aspect  of  the  Place  Nationale  on  a 
market-day,  with  its  statue  of  Duquesne,  so  brilliant 
and  vivid  in  his  great,  flapping  hat,  standing  there 
in  the  middle;  it  reminded  me  somewhat  of  the 
Good-Friday  fair  at  Venice,  which  is  held  round 
the  Goldoni  statue  near  the  Rialto.  But  the 
colours,  despite  the  strong  sunlight,  are  far  from 
Venetian.  At  the  cathedral  end  of  the  square  are 
the  butchers;  then  come  the  vegetables,  splashes 
of  somewhat  tawdry  green,  all  over  the  ground, 
and  up  and  down  the  stalls.  The  vegetables  reach 
nearly  as  far  as  the  statue;  just  this  side  of  it  begin 
the  clothes  and  commodities,  which  give  its  fair- 
like air  to  the  market.  Stalls  alternate  with  ground- 
plots,  all  alike  covered  with  cheap  trousers,  flannel 
238 


Dieppe,  1895. 

shirts,  heavy  boots  and  carpet  shoes,  braces,  foulards, 
handkerchiefs,  stays,  bright  ribbons,  veils,  balls  of 
worsted,  shoe-laces,  and,  above  all,  dress-pieces  of 
every  sort  of  common  and  trumpery  pattern.  The 
women  stop,  handle  them,  draw  them  out,  and  the 
saleswoman  waits  with  a  long  pair  of  scissors  in  her 
hand  to  cut  off  a  slice  here,  a  slice  there.  One 
dainty  little  covered  stall  has  nothing  but  white 
Norman  caps,  laid  in  rows  and  hung  in  rows,  one 
after  another.  White-capped  old  peasant  women 
stop  in  front  of  it,  compare  the  frilling  with  their 
own,  and  try  to  make  a  bargain  out  of  a  sou.  Not 
for  off  is  an  open  and  upturned  umbrella  full  of 
babies'  white  caps  and  stomachers.  A  dazzling 
collection  of  tin  spoons  and  gilt  studs  lies  on  the 
ground  beside  it,  and  the  proprietors  squat  on 
their  heels  close  by.  After  the  clothes  comes  a 
little  assemblage  of  baskets,  brushes,  and  tin  pails 
and  saucepans,  dazzlingly  white  in  the  sun.  Then 
come  the  poultry,  crates,  and  baskets  of  dead  and 
living  fowls  and  ducks  and  geese,  with  a  few  outside 
specimens ;  and  then,  as  we  reach  the  street,  where 
the  market  flows  all  the  way  up  and  down,  from 
the  quay  to  the  Cafe  des  Tribunaux,  we  have  the  fruit 
and  flowers ;  the  fruit  all  in  pale  yellows,  with  the 
vivid  red  of  tomatoes  :  the  flowers  mainly  white 
and  red,  with  a  row  of  small  palms  along  the  pave- 
ment. And  as  one  follows  the  crowded  alleys 
between  the  stalls  one  elbows  against  slow,  staring 
country-people,  the  blither  natives  of  the  town, 
the  indiflferent  visitors,  and  now  and  again  a  little 

239 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

lounging  line  of  sailors   or  fishermen  in   their  sea- 
stained  drab  or  brown. 

The  second-hand  section  of  the  market  is  strewn 
all  around  the  cathedral,  mainly  about  its  front, 
and  along  the  Rue  de  1 'Granger.  Looking  down 
from  my  window  opposite  the  great  doorway,  the 
whole  ground  seems  carpeted  with  old  clothes,  so 
old,  so  dirty,  so  discoloured,  that  one  wonders 
equally  how  they  could  have  got  there,  and  how 
those  who  have  brought  them  can  possibly  imagine 
that  they  will  ever  find  purchasers.  There  are 
coats  and  trousers,  petticoats  and  bodices,  stockings, 
bed-covers,  and  even  mattresses  (once  a  whole 
four-poster  was  placed  on  the  pavement,  which  it 
completely  filled,  just  outside  my  door);  everything 
that  can  be  folded  is  folded  neatly,  with  a  great 
economy  of  space ;  and  at  intervals  are  collections 
of  boots  laid  along  side  by  side,  eccentricities  of 
rusty  iron,  which  always  look  so  amusing  and  so 
useless  ;  old  books,  prints,  frames,  vases,  tall  hats, 
lamps,  clocks  under  glass  cases,  crockery,  and 
concertinas.  There  is  a  collection  of  earthenware, 
which  is  new ;  and  there  are  some  new  teapots, 
ribbons,  and  tin  pans.  Beyond,  where  the  Rue 
Ste.  Catherine  narrows  back  to  the  arcade  at  the 
side  of  the  church,  the  market-carts  are  laid  in  rows, 
resting  on  their  shafts.  Few  people  pass.  I 
have  never  actually  seen  anything  bought,  though 
I  would  not  take  upon  myself  to  say  that  it  never 
happens. 


240 


Dieppe,  1895. 
VI. 

The  most  absolutely  romantic  spot  in  Dieppe, 
a  spot  more  absolutely  romantic  to  its  square  inch 
than  anything  I  ever  saw,  is  the  little  curiosity-shop 
in  the  Rue  de  la  Barre.  You  look  in  through  a  long 
sort  of  covered  alley,  lined  on  both  sides  with  old 
tables,  and  mirrors,  and  bookshelves,  and  huge 
wooden  effigies  of  saints,  and  plaster  casts,  and 
scraps  of  modern  carpentry,  and  you  see  at  the 
farther  end  what  looks  like  a  garden  of  antiquities, 
in  which  all  the  oddities  of  the  earth  seem  to  be 
growing  up  out  of  trees  and  clinging  on  to  vines, 
tier  above  tier.  You  go  in  a  little  way,  and  you  see, 
first,  an  upper  floor  facing  you,  all  the  front  covered 
with  glass,  in  which  are  laid  out  the  most  precious 
items,  the  inlaid  tables,  the  Empire  clocks,  the  Louis 
XV.  chairs.  You  go  in  a  little  farther  still,  and 
you  find  yourself  in  the  garden  of  antiquities, 
which  is  even  more  fantastic  and  impossible  than 
its  first  aspect  had  intimated.  It  fills  the  square 
of  a  little  court,  round  which  curls  a  very  old  house 
trailed  over  with  vines  and  creepers ;  a  house  all 
windows  and  doors,  one  of  the  doors  opening  on 
a  spiral  stone  staircase  like  the  staircase  of  a  tower. 
At  the  farther  end  there  is  a  glass  covering,  like  an 
unfinished  conservatory ;  creepers  stretch  across 
underneath  the  glass,  and,  in  a  huge  mound,  piled 
quite  up  to  the  creepers  so  that  they  are  covered 
with  its  dust,  I  know  not  what  astonishing  bric-d-brac, 
a  mound  which  fills  the  whole  centre  of  the  court. 

241 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

There  are  chairs  and  tables,  beds,  bundles,  chests, 
pictures  in  frames,  all  sorts  of  iron  things,  and,  very 
conspicuously,  two  battered  wooden  representations 
of  the  flames  of  hell  (as  I  imagine),  the  red  paint 
much  worn  from  their  artichoke-like  shoots.  All 
around  the  walls,  wherever  there  is  room  for  a  nail 
between  a  window  and  a  vine-branch,  something  is 
hung,  plaster  bas-reliefs  and  masks,  Louis  XVI. 
mirrors,  lanterns,  Japanese  prints,  arm-chairs  with- 
out seats ;  frankly,  an  incredible  rigmarole.  I  saw 
few  desirable  objects,  but  the  charm  of  the  whole 
place,  its  unaccountability,  its  absurd  and  delightful 
romanticism,  made  up  in  themselves  a  picture 
which  hardly  needed  to  be  painted,  it  was  so 
obviously  a  picture  already. 

VII. 

One  of  the  most  characteristic  corners  of  Dieppe 
lies  in  the  unfashionable  end  of  the  town,  the  fisher 
quarter  by  the  harbour,  where  the  boats  come  in 
from  Newhaven.  Where  the  basin  narrows  to  a 
close  passage,  just  before  you  are  past  the  pier, 
and  in  the  open  sea,  there  are  two  crucifixes,  one 
on  either  side,  guarding  Dieppe.  The  boats  lie 
all  along  the  quay,  their  masts  motionless  above 
the  water,  and  it  is  along  the  quay  that  the  train 
from  Paris  comes  crawling  in  its  odd  passage  through 
the  town.  Arcades,  reminding  one  of  Padua,  run 
along  the  townward  side  of  the  quay;  they  are 
stocked  with  cheap  restaurants,  and  most  of  them 
242 


Dieppe,  1895. 

have  tiny  balconies  on  the  first  floor,  just  under  the 
roof  of  the  arcades,  and  all  of  them  have  spread 
tables  in  the  passage-way  itself:  waiters  and  women 
stroll  up  and  down  continually,  touting  for  cus- 
tomers. From  one  of  the  little  balconies  you  can 
look  across  the  fish-market,  beyond  the  masts, 
across  the  water,  to  the  green  hill  opposite,  with  its 
votive  church  on  the  summit.  The  picture  is 
framed  in  the  oval  of  one  of  the  arches,  and  it  looks 
curiously  theatrical,  and  charmingly  so,  over  the 
heads  of  the  fisher-people  and  townsfolk  who 
throng  there.  The  crier  passes,  beating  his  drum ; 
sometimes,  about  dinner-time,  a  company  of  strolling 
musicians,  a  harpist,  his  wife  and  daughter  who 
play  violins  (the  little  one  with  an  air  of  professional 
distinction)  hnger  outside  one  of  the  cafes.  Along 
the  quay,  which  stretches  out  towards  the  pier, 
is  a  broken  line  of  old,  many-coloured  houses ; 
there  are  endless  little  restaurants,  hotels,  and  cafeSy 
meant  mainly  for  the  sailors,  and  two  cafes  concerts 
of  the  seaside  sort,  with  a  piano  (the  pianist  in  one 
of  them  has  been  an  organist  in  Paris ;  drinks,  of 
course,  and  reproaches  destiny),  the  usual  platform, 
and  the  usual  enormous  women,  hoarse,  strident, 
and  decolletees,  who  collect  your  pennies  in  a  shell 
after  every  song.  There  is  a  night  cafe,  too,  on  the 
quay,  which  you  can  enter  at  any  hour :  you  tap 
on  the  glass  door,  a  curtain  is  drawn  back,  and,  if 
you  are  not  an  agent,  you  will  have  no  difficulty  in 
entering.  An  agent,  when  he  makes  his  tour  of 
inspection,  has  sometimes  to  wait  a  little,  while  a 

243 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

pack  of  drinkers  is  hurriedly  bundled  out  at  the 
back  door.  M.  Jean's  licence  appears  to  be  some- 
what vague ;  the  report  that  an  agent  is  at  the  door 
causes  a  charming  little  thrill  of  excitement  among 
his  customers.  Some  of  his  customers,  who  are 
fishermen,  I  do  not  altogether  like;  their  friendli- 
ness was  a  little  boisterous ;  and,  sometimes,  when 
they  lost  their  temper,  M.  Jean  would  knock  them 
down,  and  roll  them,  quite  roughly,  out  of  the  door. 
On  the  other  side  of  the  water,  on  the  PoUet,  as 
it  is  called,  you  find  the  real  home  of  the  fishermen, 
in  those  little  battered  houses,  twisting  around  all 
sorts  of  odd  corners,  climbing  up  all  sorts  of  odd 
heights,  some  of  them  with  wooden  beams  along 
the  front,  all  dirty  with  age,  all  open  to  the  street, 
all  with  swarms  of  draggled,  blue-eyed,  gold-haired 
children  playing  around  their  doors.  In  a  few 
corners  one  sees  women  making  nets,  once  an  in- 
dustry, now  fallen  into  some  disuse.  The  whole 
place  is  thick  with  dust,  faded  with  years,  shrivelled 
with  poverty;  but  Dowson  loved  it  more  than  any 
part  of  Dieppe. 

VIII. 

The  charm  of  Dieppe !  No,  I  can  never  give 
the  real  sense  of  that  charm  to  any  one  who  has 
never  experienced  it ;  for  myself,  it  is  not  even 
easy  to  realise  all  the  elements  which  have  gone 
to  make  up  the  happiness  of  these  two  summer 
months  here.  It  always  rests  me,  in  body  and 
244 


Dieppe,  1895. 

mind,  to  be  near  the  sea ;  and  then  Dieppe  is  so 
placid  and  indulgent,  lets  you  have  your  way  with 
it,  is  full  of  relief  for  you,  in  old  corners  and  cool 
streets,  warm  and  cool  at  once,  if  you  take  but 
five  steps  from  the  Rue  Aguado,  modern  and 
fashionable  along  the  sea-front,  dazzling  with  sun- 
light, into  any  one  of  the  little  streets  that  branch 
off  from  it  townwards.  And  if  the  sun  beats  on 
you  again  as  you  come  out  into  the  square  about 
Saint-Jacques  you  have  but  to  go  inside ;  better 
still,  if  you  seek  the  finer  interior  of  Saint-Remy ; 
and,  suddenly,  you  have  the  liquid  coldness  of  stone 
arches  that  have  never  felt  the  sun.  And  then  the 
sea,  at  night,  from  the  jetty :  the  vast  space  of 
water,  fading  mistily  into  the  unseen  limits  of  the 
horizon,  a  boat,  a  sail,  just  distinguishable  in  its 
midst,  the  lights  along  the  shore,  the  glow  of  the 
Casino,  with  all  its  windows  golden,  an  infinite 
softness  in  the  air.  I  have  spent  all  night  wandering 
about  the  beach,  I  have  traced  every  change  in  sea 
and  sky  from  twilight  to  sunrise,  inconceivable 
delicacies  of  colour,  rarities  of  tone.  And  what 
dreams  have  floated  up  in  the  smoke  of  my  cigarette, 
mere  smoke  that  would  never  reach  the  stars ! 
What  memories  I  have  evoked,  what  unforgotten 
talks  I  have  had,  in  the  cool  of  the  evening,  on  that 
jetty !  And  the  country  round  Dieppe,  rarely  as 
I  went  into  it,  that,  too,  means  something  for  me  : 
Puys,  where  I  went  with  Beardsley  to  see  Alexandre 
Dumas,  in  the  house  in  which  his  father  died,  the 
house  where  so  many  of  his  own  plays  have  been 

245 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

written ;  Pourville,  the  road  along  the  diffs ; 
Varengeville,  with  its  deep,  enchanting  country 
lanes,  its  little  sunken  ways  through  the  woods,  its 
strange,  stiff  httle  pine-woods  on  the  heights ;  the 
Manoir  d'Ango,  with  its  delicate  approach  through 
soft  alleys  of  trees,  and  past  a  little  shadowed  pool, 
the  palace  degraded  into  a  farm,  but  still  with  its 
memories  of  Francis  I.  and  Diane  de  Poitiers, 
whose  faces  one  sees,  cheek  by  cheek,  on  a  double 
medallion;  Arques  la  Bataille,  with  its  Italian 
landscape,  so  cunningly  composed  about  the  ruined 
castle  on  the  hill.  There  is  nothing  in  or  near 
Dieppe  which  does  not,  in  one  way  or  another, 
appeal  to  me;  nowhere  that  I  do  not  feel  at  home. 
And  the  friends  I  have  made,  or  found,  or  fancied 
at  Dieppe,  men  and  women  of  such  varying  charm 
and  interest !  The  most  amiable  soul  in  all  the 
world  resides,  I  think,  in  the  Anglo-maniac  French 
painter  in  whose  chalet  I  spent,  so  agreeably,  so 
much  of  my  time,  in  the  studio  where  he  paints 
the  passing  beauties  as  they  fly.  Was  there  not, 
too,  the  hospitable  Norwegian  painter,  with  the 
heart  of  a  child  in  the  body  of  a  giant,  who  lived  with 
his  frank  and  friendly  wife  in  the  villa  on  the  hill, 
where  I  spent  so  many  good-tempered  evenings  ? 
And  the  young  English  painter,  Conder,  who  was 
my  chief  companion,  a  temperament  of  1830,  ne 
romantique,  in  whose  conversation  I  found  the  subtle 
superficialities  of  a  profoundly  sensitive  individuality, 
it  was  an  education  in  the  fine  shades  to  be  with 
him.  The  other  younger  Englishman,  an  artist 
246 


Dieppe,  1895. 

of  so  different  a  kind,  came  into  our  little  society 
with  a  refreshing  and  troubling  bizarrerie;  all  that 
feverish  brilliance,  the  boyish  defiance  of  things, 
the  frail  and  intense  vitality,  how  amusing  and  un- 
common it  was  !  And  there  were  the  two  French 
poets,  again  so  different  from  one  another;  elegant 
and  enthusiastic  youth,  and  the  insistent  reflective- 
ness of  a  mind  always  reasoning.  And  then  the 
charming  women  one  met  as  they  flitted  to  and  fro 
between  Dieppe  and  Paris  and  London  and  Monte 
Carlo ;  the  little  French  lady  whose  mother  had 
been  one  of  the  Court  beauties  of  the  Second 
Empire ;  her  profile  de  mouton,  with  the  hysterical 
piquancy  of  a  mouth,  perfect  in  repose,  which  would 
never  rest :  heartless,  exquisite,  posing  little  person  ! 
And  there  was  Cleo  de  Merode,  with  her  slim, 
natural,  and  yet  artificial  elegance,  her  little,  straight 
face,  so  virginal  and  yet  so  aware,  under  the 
Madonna-like  placidity  of  those  smooth  coils  of 
hair,  drawn  over  the  ears  and  curved  along  the 
forehead ;  it  is  Cleo  de  Merode,  who,  more  than 
any  one  else,  sums  up  Dieppe  for  me.  How  many 
other  beautiful  faces  there  were,  people  one  never 
knew,  and  yet,  meeting  them  at  every  hour,  at 
dinner,  on  the  terrace  of  the  Casino,  at  the  tables, 
in  the  sea,  one  seemed  to  know  them  almost  better 
than  one's  friends,  and  to  be  known  by  them  just 
as  well.  Much  of  the  charm  of  life  exists  for  me 
in  the  unspoken  interest  which  forms  a  sort  of 
electric  current  between  oneself  and  strangers.  It 
is  a  real  emotion  to  me,  satisfying,  in  a  sense,  for 

247 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

the  very  reason  that  it  leaves  one  unsatisfied.  And 
of  this  kind  of  emotion  Dieppe,  in  the  season,  is 
bewilderingly  abundant.  Is  it,  after  all,  surprising 
that  I  should  have  come  to  Dieppe  with  the  intention 
of  staying  from  Saturday  to  Monday,  and  that  I 
should  have  stayed  for  two  months  ? 


Summer,  1895. 


248 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

I. 

Under  the  trees  in  the  dell, 

Here  by  the  side  of  the  stream. 
Were  it  not  pleasant  to  dream, 

Were  it  not  better  to  dwell  ? 

Here  is  the  blue  of  the  sea, 
Here  is  the  green  of  the  land, 
Valley  and  meadow  and  sand, 

Sea-bird  and  cricket  and  bee ; 

Cows  in  a  field  on  the  hill, 

Farmyards  a-fluster  with  pigs. 
Blossoming  birds  on  the  twigs; 

Cool,  the  old  croon  of  the  mill. 

At  Helston  the  last  Cornish  railway  ends,  on  a 
railed  motor-track  coming  from  Gwinear  Road ; 
and  from  Helston  to  Poltescoe  it  is  a  drive  of  ten 
miles,  for  the  last  part  of  the  way  along  the  edge 
of  Goonhilly  Downs.  As  we  come  into  Poltescoe 
Valley  the  road  becomes  steeper,  and  we  climb 
and  descend  through  high  green  hedges,  until,  just 
after  the  bridge,  we  turn  aside  into  a  narrow  lane, 
and,  after  passing  a  double  cottage  and  a  smithy, 
come  around  a  slow  curve  to  the  thatched  cottage 
standing  inside  a  little  garden.  There  are  fields 
on  the  slope  of  a  hill  opposite,  and,  lower  down, 
where  the  road  turns  around  an  edge  of  solid  rock, 
there  is  a  stream,  going  by  an  old  mill,  and,  beyond 
it,  a  steep  rocky  hill,  with  clusters  of  trees,  bracken, 
gorse,  and  rough  green  foliage,  rising  up  against 
the  sky,  between  the  valley  and  the  sea. 

249 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

I  have  never  lived  in  so  peaceful  a  place,  and 
the  old  miller  who  Hves  by  himself  at  the  mill  — 
"like  a  single  plover,"  he  tells  me  —  says  that  the 
people  like  the  restfulness  and  do  not  willingly 
leave  it.  The  washerwoman  who  has  part  of  the 
double  cottage  along  the  lane  says  that  she  would 
go  mad  if  she  went  to  live  in  a  town,  and  that  the 
mere  thought  of  it,  sometimes,  as  she  goes  in  and 
out  of  her  door  all  day  long,  makes  her  feel  uneasy. 
The  miller  says  that  the  people  do  not  notice  the 
beauty  of  the  place  much,  because  they  are  used  to 
it ;  but  he  himself  told  me  that,  so  far  as  he  can 
hear,  it  is  the  prettiest  place  in  England. 

The  cottage  has  a  few  disadvantages.  One  is 
that  I  cannot  stand  quite  upright  in  either  of  the 
lower  rooms.  When  a  labourer  lived  in  it  there  was, 
of  course,  a  stone  floor,  and  the  wooden  floor  which 
the  new  landlord  has  put  in  has  brought  the  ceiling 
lower.  Where  the  ceiling  is  plain  I  can  stand  up- 
right ;  but  there  are  cross-beams,  and  the  doors  are 
lower  than  the  cross-beams,  and  I  have  to  go  about 
stooping,  for  fear  of  dashing  my  head  against  one 
or  the  other. 

Then  there  is  that  very  decorative  and  in  some 
ways  practical  thing,  a  thatched  roof.  I  have  always 
wanted  to  sleep  under  a  thatched  roof,  but  the  actual 
experience  has  chilled  my  enthusiasm.  There  is 
the  delight  of  looking  at  it  from  the  hill  going  up 
to  Ruan  Minor,  like  a  corkscrew,  on  the  other  side 
of  the  valley;  and  there  is  the  delight  of  sitting 
under  the  eaves  and  hearing  the  sudden  soft  rustle 
250 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

of  wings  as  the  birds  fly  in  and  out  of  their  nests 
among  the  thatch.  But  when  you  find,  on  going 
to  bed,  a  Httle  red  worm  sitting  on  the  pillow ;  when 
black  spots  of  various  shapes  and  sizes  begin  to 
move  and  crawl  on  the  wall  and  ceiling;  when  the 
open  window,  which  lets  in  all  the  scents  and 
sounds  of  the  country,  lets  in  also  whatever  creeps 
and  flies  among  the  bushes  —  sleep  under  a  thatched 
roof  becomes  a  less  desirable  thing. 

But  for  these  slight  drawbacks,  which  have  their 
compensations  as  one  sits  at  night,  reading  by  lamp- 
light, in  rooms  so  pleasantly  and  quaintly  pro- 
portioned, and  the  painted  butterflies  and  sombre 
moths  come  in  at  the  window  and  dash  themselves 
ecstatically  at  the  light :  well,  I  can  ask  no  more 
of  a  cottage.  And  then,  with  the  cottage,  have  we 
not  the  indispensable  Mrs,  Pascoe,  and  is  not  Mrs. 
Pascoe  the  contriver  of  all  expedients  and  the  journal 
and  encylopaedia  of  all  local  knowledge  ? 


IT. 

All  day  I  watch  the  sun  and  rain 
That  come  and  go  and  come  again, 
The  doubtful  twilights,  and,  at  dawn 
And  sunset,  curtains  half  withdrawn 
From  open  windows  of  the  sky. 
The  birds  sing  and  the  sea-gulls  cry 
All  day  in  many  tongues ;   the  bees 
Hum  in  and  out  under  the  trees 
Where  the  capped  foxglove  on  his  stem 
Shakes  all  his  bells  and  nods  to  them. 

251 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

All  day  under  the  rain  and  sun 
The  hours  go  over  one  by  one, 
Brimmed  up  with  delicate  events 
Of  moth-flights  and  the  birth  of  scents 
And  evening  deaths  of  butterflies. 
And  I,  withdrawn  into  my  eyes 
From  that  strict  tedious  world  within, 
Each  day  with  joyous  haste  begin 
To  live  a  new  day  through,  and  then 
Sleep,  and  then  live  it  through  again. 

What  gives  its  chief  charm  to  the  country  about 
Poltescoe  Valley  is  its  intimate  mingling  of  two 
separate  kinds  of  scenery  —  the  v^ildest  scenery  of 
rocks,  cliffs,  and  the  sea,  and  the  softest  and  most 
luxuriant  scenery  of  an  inland  valley.  And  the 
two  are  not  merely  there  side  by  side,  but  they 
interpenetrate  one  another  in  an  indefinite  series 
of  surprises.  Walking  across  meadows,  one  comes 
suddenly  upon  a  ridge  of  rocks,  like  a  reef  in  the 
sea,  coming  up  out  of  the  grass,  and  partly  covered 
with  greenery ;  sea-birds  fly  among  rocks  or  stand 
in  companies  on  the  fields ;  one  hears  the  sound 
of  waves  dashing  on  unseen  cliffs  as  one  saunters 
through  a  lane  deep  between  hedges ;  a  wheat-field 
stands  out  detached  on  a  hill  summit  against  the 
white  sails  of  a  ship  at  sea. 

Among  these  valleys  and  on  the  wooded  tops 
of  the  hills  there  are  flowers  around  every  cottage ; 
flowers  climb  up  the  walls  and  about  the  door- 
posts, geraniums,  nasturtiums,  red  and  pink  and 
veined  roses  ;  arum-lilies  grow  in  the  narrow  strip 
of  front  garden ;  there  are  clusters  of  fuchsia  and 
252 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

veronica,  there  are  hydrangeas  and  gladiolas  and 
dahhas ;  and  the  hedges  are  full  of  honeysuckle, 
of  foxgloves,  of  blue  and  yellow  flowers.  The  air, 
as  one  passes,  is  laden  with  sweets ;  warm,  aromatic 
winds  blow  softly  across  one's  face ;  and  the  sleek 
and  shining  cattle  graze  in  fields  green  to  the  sea's 
edge,  and  rest  under  the  shadow  of  wide  trees.  At 
low  tide  the  cows  come  down  from  the  fields  to 
Kennack  Bay,  and  walk  to  and  fro  on  the  sand, 
pausing  and  looking  at  the  sea,  the  rocks,  and  drink- 
ing from  the  streams  of  fresh  water  that  run  down 
the  sand.  Slow  cart-horses,  that  walk  freely  about 
the  lanes  at  all  hours  of  the  day  and  night,  come  down 
to  the  bay,  and  trudge  to  and  fro,  and  lay  their  heads 
on  one  another's  shoulders  as  they  stand  sleepily 
together. 

After  sunset,  if  you  go  up  the  road  as  far  as 
Kuggar,  and  stand  there  between  the  fields  and  the 
sea,  you  will  hear  the  drones  humming  by  the  way- 
side and  throbbing  about  the  flowers  and  gorse  in 
the  hedges,  red  cows  graze  in  green  fields,  and  you 
hear  the  deep,  half-human  sigh  of  some  unseen 
beast  behind  the  hedge,  or  a  few  late  twitters  among 
the  branches.  There  is  a  moon  in  the  pale  sky 
growing  from  faint  silver  to  a  sickle  golden  as  ripe 
corn;  wide  green  valleys  rising  and  dipping  like 
sea  waves,  almost  to  the  edge  of  the  clifi^s  that  go 
down  dark  into  the  sea;  and,  as  far  as  the  rim  of 
the  sky,  the  sea,  grey-blue,  motionless  except  where 
it  curls  into  abrupt  white  waves  and  breaks  into 
foam  around  the  rocks  or  upon   the   beach.     And 

253 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

as  you  stand  there,  seeing  only  faint  sights  and 
hearing  only  faint  sounds,  there  is  a  dehcate  loneH- 
ness  in  things,  not  Hke  a  real  feeling,  not  a  weight, 
but  an  impression,  vague  and  dim-coloured  and 
wholly  pleasant,  like  the  sentiment,  not  of  real 
things,  but  of  a  picture. 

From  Poltescoe  the  nearest  way  down  to  the 
sea  is  by  Carleon  Cove,  but  I  only  pass  there  on 
my  way  to  the  cliffs  leading  to  Cadgwith ;  I  never 
linger  there.  It  is  disfeatured  and  defeated,  an 
ugly  gash  in  the  cliff-side.  There  is  always  some- 
thing gloomy  and  uncomfortable  in  its  cramped 
bed  of  pebbles,  the  great  dark  cliff,  covered  thinly 
with  green  turf,  which  rises  to  so  steep  a  height 
above  it,  and  the  broken  and  deserted  sheds,  chim- 
neys, and  water-wheel,  where  the  serpentine  works 
had  been.  The  water  still  runs  along  a  wooden 
tray  from  the  river  to  the  great  wheel,  and  some- 
times, by  accident,  the  rusty  thing  begins  to  turn, 
with  a  ghastly  clanking,  like  a  dead  thing  galvanised 
into  some  useless  and  unnatural  semblance  of  life. 
The  place  is  uncanny,  like  all  solitary  places  which 
men  have  spoiled  and  then  deserted. 

Kennack  Bay,  where  there  is  always  a  stretch 
of  sand,  and  at  low  tide  a  long  expanse  of  it,  is  like 
a  broad  and  cheerful  face,  open  to  the  Hght.  You 
enter  the  bay  by  a  latched  gate,  and  then,  at  most, 
seasons,  cross  a  brook  by  stepping-stones.  At 
each  end  of  the  sand  there  are  clusters  of  rocks, 
beginning  under  the  cliffs,  and  on  one  side  going 
out  a  long  way  into  the  sea,  looking  at  low  tide  like 

254 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

the  brown  ridged  backs  of  crocodiles  that  have  swum 
to  the  surface  of  the  water.  On  the  other  side  the 
rocks  nearest  to  the  chfFs  are  seen,  as  you  go  near 
them,  to  be  coloured  as  if  the  liquid  colours  of  the 
sea,  its  many  greens  and  its  purple  stains  over  hidden 
rocks,  had  been  reflected  and  frozen  in  stone. 
When  the  tide  is  out,  the  farther  rocks,  left  bare 
by  the  sea,  are  seen  in  strange  outlines,  sharp, 
broken,  as  if  hewn  into  cavities  and  suff"ering  from 
many  rents  and  gashes.  And  there  is  one  "cirque 
of  fantastic  rocks,"  half  enclosing  a  little  sea-pool, 
and  flanked  by  a  tall,  broad,  and  twisted  rock, 
which  is  like  the  sea  cavern  in  Leonardo's  Virgin 
of  the  Rocks.  Animal  content  can  go  no  farther 
than  to  lie,  after  bathing,  on  a  natural  pillow  of 
hollowed  rocks  on  the  green  edge  of  the  cliff,  and 
to  look  out  through  half-shut  eyelids  upon  the  wet 
sand  of  the  beach,  the  dark  semicircle  of  cliffs  going 
round  to  the  Lizard,  and  the  softer  semicircle  of 
thin  green  meadows  and  wooded  hollows  inland ; 
with  the  blue  sky  and  the  bluer  sea,  coloured  like 
the  Mediterranean,  all  around  and  all  over  one, 
glittering  evenly  in  the  sunlight.  Little  white 
waves  break  on  the  beach,  with  a  low  continuous 
sound  of  falling  water ;  a  bird's  shadow  darkens 
the  sand,  and  if  you  lift  your  hat-brim  you  see  the 
white  sea-bird  ;  sheep  and  cows  bend  over  the  grass 
together  in  fields ;  sleep  hangs  over  land  and  sea 
with  a  delicate  oppression. 


255 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

III. 

The  woodpecker  laughed  as  he  sat  on  the  bough, 

This  morning, 

To  give  fair  warning, 
And  the  rain's  in  the  valley  now. 

Look  now  and  listen  :   I  hear  the  noise 

Of  the  thunder, 

And  deep  down  under 
The  sea's  voice  answers  the  voice. 

All  the  leaves  of  the  valley  are  glad. 

And  the  birds  too, 

If  they  had  words  to. 
Would  tell  of  the  joy  they  had. 

Only  you  at  the  window,  with  rueful  lips 

Half  pouting, 

Stand  dumb  and  doubting, 
And  drum  with  your  finger-tips. 

Cornish  rain  is  a  cheerful,  persistent  downpour, 
which  comes  down  softly  in  a  warm  flood,  washing 
the  whole  valley  and  the  trees,  and  burnishing  the 
grassy  sides  of  the  valley,  and  lying  like  a  dark  mist 
over  the  faded  headlands  and  the  grey  sea.  The 
stream  that  generally  trickles  over  the  pebbles  by 
the  old  mill  has  swollen  to  a  yellow  river,  and  takes 
broad  leaps  from  stone  to  stone.  One  can  hear 
the  whips  of  the  rain  steadily  lashing  the  hedges 
and  the  trees.  And,  louder  than  the  sound  of  wind 
and  rain,  is  heard  the  sound  of  the  river  rushing, 
like  the  sound  of  the  sea. 

Going  down  to  Kennack  Bay,  at  high  tide,  after 
256 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

a  day  of  ceaseless  rain,  one  sees  a  line  of  white  foam 
around  the  whole  coast,  edging  a  sea  which  has 
turned  to  a  strange  leaden  green,  veiled  with  sea- 
mist,  which  comes  driving  across  it  in  a  wet  vapour, 
which,  as  it  floats  up  the  valley,  looks  like  a  trans- 
parent gauze.  One  breathes  water,  one  sees  scarce 
anything  but  water,  the  sohd  mass  of  the  sea  and 
a  racing  vapour  in  the  air ;  one  hears  nothing  but 
water.  The  long  level  cliflF  going  out  to  Pedn 
Boar  has  faded  to  a  dim  outline  in  a  mist;  white 
mists  settle  on  the  upper  fields  in  the  valley  :  the 
whole  earth  seems  to  melt  away  into  a  wreck  and 
image  of  water. 

Walking,  after  the  rain,  on  the  cliffs  towards 
Cadgwith,  the  air  is  at  once  salt  and  sweet;  the 
scent  of  the  sea  and  of  the  earth  mingles  in  it ;  and 
it  is  as  if  one  drank  a  perfumed  wine,  in  which  there 
is  a  sharp  and  suave  intoxication.  Overhead  the 
sea-gulls  curve  in  wide  circles;  you  see  them  at 
one  moment  black  against  the  pale  sky,  then  white 
against  the  dark  cliffs,  then  matching  the  flakes  of 
foam  on  the  sea  as  they  fly  low  over  it.  They  poise 
in  the  air,  and  cry  and  laugh  with  their  mocking 
half-human  voices;  and  are  always  passing  to  and 
fro  in  some  rhythm  or  on  some  business  of  their 
own. 

Or,  if  one  would  taste  a  new  sensation,  neither  of 
valley,  cliff,  nor  sea,  one  has  but  to  turn  inland  from 
Kennack  and  cross  the  downs.  A  path  leads  up 
between  hedges  full  of  honeysuckle,  gorse,  and  tall 
white  heather,   among  steep   rocks   covered   almost 

257 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

all  over  with  green.  Where  the  downs  begin  you 
can  see  the  sea,  behind  you,  caught  in  an  angle  of 
the  land ;  and  then  the  moorland,  barer  and  barer, 
until  green  turf  stretches  flat  to  a  hne  of  tall  black 
trees  against  the  sky.  A  straight,  flat,  narrow 
road  goes  across  the  downs,  and  as  one  walks  along 
it  there  is  a  sense  of  loneliness  which  is  bare,  severe, 
but  not  desolate  or  unfriendly.  The  wind  blows 
across  them  from  the  sea,  as  from  a  living  thing 
not  far  off";  and  there  is  the  freedom,  the  unspoilt 
homeliness,  of  the  earth  left  to  itself. 


IV. 

To  live  and  die  under  a  roof 
Drives  the  brood  of  thoughts  aloof; 
To  walk  by  night  under  the  sky 
Lets  the  birds  of  thought  fly ; 
Thoughts  that  may  not  fly  abroad 
Rot  like  lilies  in  the  road ; 
But  the  thoughts  that  fly  too  far 
May  singe  their  wings  against  a  star. 

Outside  the  valley  you  may  walk  from  sea  to 
sea  by  land.  If  you  go  north-west,  you  will  come 
to  Coverack,  along  cliff^s  which  grow  barer  and 
barer  as  the  trees  dwindle  and  the  road  slopes  down 
to  the  seashore.  If  you  go  southward,  you  will 
come  to  Cadgwith  and  the  Lizard ;  and,  again, 
as  you  leave  the  region  of  Poltescoe  Valley,  you 
will  find  the  cliffs  growing  barer  and  barer,  and  will 
come  north-west  to  Kynance  Cove,  and  thence  to 
258 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

Mullion,    which    lies    almost    level   with    Coverack, 
on  the  other  side  of  Cornwall. 

Coverack  is  a  cluster  of  white  houses  built  on 
the  side  of  a  headland  which  goes  out  delicately 
into  the  sea,  curving  round  to  the  harbour,  which 
the  lowest  houses  seem  to  go  down  into.  Low 
green  land  goes  out  across  a  breadth  of  water  to 
form  a  bay ;  and  you  see  the  roads  sloping  precipi- 
tately over  the  downs  to  the  pebbles  on  the  edge  of 
the  blue  water,  and  right  above  the  roofs  of  the 
houses.  On  the  other  side  of  the  headland  there 
is  another  breadth  of  water ;   one  feels  the  open  sea. 

At  Cadgwith  you  see  the  sea  from  the  beach 
as  through  the  frame  of  a  doorway  narrowed  to 
that  measure;  and  the  cramped  and  peevish  beach 
is  split  in  two  by  a  rocky  promontory,  and  gripped 
on  either  side  by  a  tall  cliff,  which  on  one  side  is 
bare  rock,  and  on  the  other  a  great  swath  of  green, 
as  if  combed  upward  by  the  wind.  Sea-gulls  sit 
there,  on  the  edge  of  the  land,  clustered  like  a  bed 
of  lilies;  or  swoop  downward  and  fly  to  and  fro 
over  the  beach,  among  the  litter  of  boats  and  nets 
and  lobster-pots,  when  the  fishermen  are  cleaning 
the  fish.  Looking  down  from  above,  thick  trees 
and  the  fold  of  sloping  green  meadows  cut  off  all 
of  the  village  but  its  brown  thatched  roofs  and  a 
ghmpse  of  white-washed  walls.  It  huddles  there 
in  the  cleft  of  the  valley  where  the  valley  shps  feet 
foremost  into  the  sea. 

At  Mullion  Cove  you  are  as  if  imprisoned,  deep 
down,  inside  a  narrow  harbour,  no  more  than  two 

259 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

boat-lengths  wide  at  the  entrance,  where  the  sea 
chafes  at  the  wall  and  at  the  rocks  planted  hugely 
without,  great  black  heights  which  cut  off  half 
the  sunlight  as  you  pass  into  their  shadow.  Sea- 
gulls sit  there  in  shoals,  crying  against  the  wind. 
There  is  a  fierce  seclusion  in  the  place,  disquieting, 
and  with  its  own  narrow  and  unfriendly  charm. 

Kynance  Cove,  with  its  mysterious  regular 
daily  appearance  and  disappearance,  is  like  the 
work  of  a  wizard,  who  has  arranged  its  coming  and 
going  for  magical  purposes  of  his  own,  and  has  laid 
this  carpet  of  pure  sand  about  the  bases  of  fantastic 
rocks  and  under  the  roof  of  sombre  caverns,  and  has 
set  the  busy  sea  to  wash  and  polish  and  scrub  with 
sand  and  stones  the  smooth  surface  of  the  rocks 
and  caverns,  until  they  glow  with  a  kind  of  flushed 
and  fiery  darkness,  in  which  can  be  discerned  colours 
of  green  and  red  and  purple  and  grey,  veining  the 
substance  of  the  rock  as  with  the  green  of  the  sea 
and  the  purple  of  heather  and  as  with  pale  jade  and 
as  with  clots  of  blood.  The  cove  is  sunk  deeply 
between  green  and  stony  cliflfs,  and  the  sea  washes 
into  it  from  all  sides,  hissing  and  shouting  in  crevices 
and  passages  which  it  has  spht  and  bored  in  the 
rock  itself.  It  is  a  battle-ground  of  the  sea,  and  a 
place  of  wild  freshness,  and  a  home  of  sea-birds. 
Man  comes  into  it  on  sufferance,  and  at  hours  not 
of  his  choosing.  He  sets  his  wit  against  the  craft 
of  the  tide,  and  wins  no  more  than  a  humble  edge 
or  margin  of  permission. 

I   came   first   upon   the   Lizard   across   heathery 
260 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

grass  smelling  of  honey  and  sea-wind,  on  a  day 
towards  sunset  when  the  sea  lay  steel  blue  to  the 
immense  circle  of  the  horizon ;  fierce  clouds  rose 
there  like  barriers  of  solid  smoke,  and  where  the 
sun  set  unseen  behind  a  cloudy  darkness,  throwing 
a  broad  sheet  of  shining  light  across  the  water,  I 
could  see  a  long  line  of  land  going  out  towards 
Land's  End,  hardly  distinguishable  from  the  spume 
and  froth  of  rain-clouds  darkening  upon  it.  Un- 
limited water,  harsh  rock,  steep  precipices  going 
down  sheer  into  the  sea;  in  the  sea,  fierce  jags  of 
rock,  with  birds  clustered  on  them,  and  httle  circles 
of  white  foam  around  their  bases ;  the  strong  air  and 
stormy  light  seemed  in  keeping  with  this  end  of 
land  where  England  goes  farthest  south  into  the  sea. 

V. 

Leaves  and  grasses  and  the  rill 

That  babbles  by  the  water-mill ; 

Bramble,  fern,  and  bulrushes, 

Honeysuckle  and  honey-bees ; 

Summer  rain  and  summer  sun 

By  turns  before  the  day  is  done ; 

Rainy  laughter,  twilight  whir. 

The  nighthawk  and  the  woodpecker; 

These  and  such  as  these  delights 

Attend  upon  our  days  and  nights, 

With  the  honey-heavy  air. 

Thatched  slumber,  cream,  and  country  fare. 

In  the  valley,  across  fields  in  which  rocks  like 
the  rocks  on  the  seashore  grow  naturally,  with  ferns 
and  bramble  about  them,  buried  deep  among  old 

261 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

trees,  murmuring  with  rooks,  there  is  a  decayed 
manor-house,  now  a  farm,  called  Erisey :  an 
Erisey  of  Erisey  is  said  to  have  danced  before 
James  I.  The  road  leads  over  many  Cornish  stiles, 
and  through  farmyards  where  cows  wait  around 
the  milking-stool,  or  hens  scratch  beside  the  barn 
door,  or  pigs  hurry  to  a  trough.  The  air  is  heavy 
with  scents  from  the  hedges  and  with  the  clean, 
homely  odour  of  farms ;  there  is  nothing  in  this 
wooded  place  to  remind  one  that  the  sea  lies  on  the 
other  side  of  a  few  fields.  And  yet  I  have  always 
felt  some  obscure,  inexplicable,  uneasy  sense  or 
suggestion  when  I  come  near  this  old  house  set 
over  against  a  little  wood,  in  which  Mehsande 
might  have  walked ;  the  wood  has  a  solemn  entrance, 
through  curved  and  pillared  stone  gateways ;  the 
grass  is  vivid  green  underfoot,  and  the  tree  trunks 
go  up  straight  in  a  formal  pattern.  The  old  house 
at  the  door  of  the  wood  seems  to  slumber  uneasily, 
as  if  secrets  were  hidden  there,  somewhere  behind 
the  thick  ivy  and  the  decayed  stone.  The  villagers 
will  not  go  that  way  after  dark,  because  of  a  field 
that  lies  on  the  road  there,  which  they  call  Dead- 
man's  Field. 

Sunset  comes  delicately  into  the  wood  at  Erisey, 
setting  gold  patches  to  dance  on  the  dark  trunks 
of  the  trees.  But  it  is  from  the  downs,  or  from 
the  croft  which  lies  between  the  cottage  and  the 
sea,  that  I  like  best  to  see  the  day  end.  From  the 
downs,  or  from  the  road  just  above  the  cottage, 
the  sky  has  often  that  amber  light  which  Coleridge 
262 


A  Valley  in  Cornwall. 

notes  in  his  poems ;  with  infinite  gradations  of 
green,  and  a  strange  heaping  of  sullen  and  bodiless 
clouds  against  pure  brightness.  From  the  fields 
at  Carleon,  between  the  valley  and  the  sea,  night  is 
seen  touching  the  valley  into  a  gentle  and  glowing 
harmony.  The  valley,  a  deep  dell  sunk  into  the 
midst  of  a  circle  of  rocks  covered  with  thin  green 
foliage,  is  a  nest  and  bower  of  soft  trees,  which  rise 
cluster  above  cluster  almost  to  the  edge  of  the  sky, 
where  the  rocky  line  of  the  fields  ends  it.  Above, 
you  see  the  bars  of  colour  left  over  by  the  sunset ; 
the  moon  hangs  aloft  between  the  valley  and  the 
sea;  and  as  the  valley  withdraws  into  the  rich  dark- 
ness of  the  earth,  the  sea  still  ghtters  with  grey 
light,  to  where  white  clouds  come  down  out  of  the 
sky  and  rest  upon  it. 

Tidings  of  the  outer  world  come  but  rarely  into 
the  valley,  except  by  way  of  the  sky.  Once  a  day 
the  old  postman  comes  down  from  Ruan  Minor, 
and  takes  the  letters  back  to  the  post-office.  At 
times  the  sound  of  a  siren,  like  the  lowing  of  a  brazen 
ox,  comes  paradoxically  into  the  midst  of  the  hot 
inland  scents.  At  times  a  farm-boy  following  the 
cows,  or  a  man  sitting  on  the  shafts  of  his  cart,  passes, 
whistling;  and  the  tune  will  be  a  hymn  tune,  "Jesu, 
lover  of  my  soul,"  or  an  air  as  old  as  "Rule 
Britannia,"  taken  very  slowly.  If  you  hear  the 
people  talking  to  one  another  in  the  lane,  you  will 
notice  that  they  speak  and  reply  in  phrases  out 
of  the  Bible,  as  in  a  language  of  which  they  can 
catch  every  allusion.     They  never  pass  one  another 

263 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

without  stopping  to  talk,  and  every  one  of  them 
greets  you  with  the  time  of  the  day  as  you  pass. 
All  day  long  the  tree  before  the  door  of  the 
cottage  is  filled  with  music,  and  at  night,  when  the 
moon  is  up,  the  sky  before  the  windows  is  flooded 
with  strange  shapes  and  motions  of  light.  I  have 
never  seen  the  moon's  magic  so  nimbly  or  so  con- 
tinuously at  work  as  upon  that  space  of  sky  where 
the  higher  ridges  of  the  croft  ended.  Kingdoms 
and  seas  of  cloud  passed  before  us  under  that  calm 
radiance;  they  passed,  leaving  the  sky  clear  for 
the  stars ;  the  polar  star  stood  over  the  cottage, 
and  the  Great  Bear  flung  out  his  paws  at  the  moon. 

Gold  and  blue  of  a  sunset  sky. 

Bees  that  buzz  with  a  sleepy  tune, 

A  lowing  cow  and  a  cricket's  cry, 
Swallows  flying  across  the  moon. 

Swallows  flying  across  the  moon. 

The  trees  darken,  the  fields  grow  white; 
Day  is  over,  and  night  comes  soon  : 

The  wings  are  all  gone  into  the  night. 

Summer,  1904. 


264 


At  the  Land's  End. 

The  temperament  of  Cornish  landscape  has  many 
moods  and  will  fit  into  no  formula.  To-day  I  have 
spent  the  most  flawless  day  of  any  summer  I  can 
remember  on  the  sands  of  Kennack  Bay,  at  the 
edge  of  that  valley  in  Cornwall  which  I  have  written 
about  in  these  pages.  Sea  and  sky  were  like  opals, 
with  something  in  them  of  the  colour  of  absinthe; 
and  there  was  a  bloom  like  the  bloom  on  grapes 
over  all  the  outlines  of  cliffy  and  moorland,  the  steep 
rocks  glowing  in  the  sunshine  with  a  warm  and  rich 
and  soft  and  coloured  darkness.  Every  outline 
was  distinct,  yet  all  fell  into  a  sort  of  harmony, 
which  was  at  once  voluptuous  and  reticent.  The 
air  was  like  incense  and  the  sun  like  fire,  and  the 
whole  atmosphere  and  aspect  of  things  seemed 
to  pass  into  a  kind  of  happy  ecstasy.  Here  all 
nature  seemed  good ;  yet,  in  that  other  part  of 
Cornwall  from  which  I  have  but  just  come,  the 
region  of  the  Land's  End,  I  found  myself  among 
formidable  and  mysterious  shapes,  in  a  world  of 
granite  rocks  that  are  fantastic  by  day,  but  by 
night  become  ominous  and  uncouth,  like  the  halls 
of  giants,  with  giants  sitting  in  every  doorway,  erect 
and  unbowed,  watching  against  the  piratical  on- 
slaughts of  the  sea. 

About  the  Land's  End  the  land  is  bare,  harsh, 
and  scarred ;  here  and  there  are  fields  of  stunted 
grass,  stony,  and  hedged  with  low  hedges  of  bare 
stones,  like  the  fields  of  Galway ;  and,  for  the  rest, 
haggard    downs    of    flowerless    heather,    sown  with 

265 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

grey  rocks,  and  gashed  with  lean  patches  through 
which  the  naked  soil  shows  black.  The  cliflPs  are 
of  granite  and  go  down  sheer  into  the  sea,  naked, 
or  thinly  clad  with  lichen,  grey,  green,  and  occasion- 
ally orange;  they  are  built  up  with  great  blocks 
and  columns,  or  stacked  together  in  tiers,  fitted 
and  clamped  hke  cyclopean  architecture;  or  climb 
rock  by  rock,  leaning  inwards,  or  lean  outward, 
rock  poised  upon  rock,  as  if  a  touch  would  dislodge 
them,  poised  and  perpetual.  They  are  heaped 
into  altars,  massed  into  thrones,  carved  by  the  sea 
into  fantastic  shapes  of  men  and  animals ;  they  are 
hke  castles  and  hke  knights  in  armour;  they  are 
split  and  stained,  like  bulwarks  of  rusty  iron, 
blackened  with  age  and  water;  they  are  like  the 
hulls  of  old  battleships,  not  too  old  to  be  impreg- 
nable ;  and  they  have  human  names  and  the  names 
of  beasts.  They  nod  and  peer  with  human  heads 
and  wigs,  open  sharks'  fangs  out  of  the  water, 
strut  and  poise  with  an  uncouth  mockery  of  motion, 
and  are  as  if  mysteriously  and  menacingly  alive. 

This  is  the  land  of  giants  :  there  is  the  Giant's 
Chair  at  Tol-Pedn,  and  the  Giant's  Pulpit  at  Bos- 
cawen,  and  the  Giant's  Foot  at  Tolcarne,  and  the 
Giant's  Hand  on  Carn  Brea.  And  there  is  a 
mediaeval  humour  in  Cornish  legends  which  still 
plays  freakishly  with  the  devil  and  with  the  saints. 
Here,  more  than  anywhere  in  Cornwall,  I  can  under- 
stand the  temper  of  Cornish  legends,  because  here 
I  can  see  the  visible  images  of  popular  beliefs : 
the  Satanic  humour,  the  play  of  giants,  the  goblin 
266 


At  the  Land's  End. 

gambols  of  the  spirits  of  the  earth  and  of  the  sea. 
The  scenery  here  is  not  subHme,  nor  is  it  exquisite, 
as  in  other  parts  of  the  county ;  but  it  has  a  gross 
earthly  gaiety,  as  of  Nature  untamed  and  uncouth ; 
a  rough  playmate,  without  pity  or  unkindness,  wild, 
boisterous,  and  laughing.  There  is  an  eerie  laughter 
along  these  coasts,  which  seem  made  not  only  for 
the  wreckers  who  bloodied  them,  and  for  the 
witches  whose  rocky  chairs  are  shown  you,  where 
they  sat  brewing  tempests,  but  for  the  tormented 
and  ridiculous  roarings  of  Tregeagle  and  the  ele- 
mental monsters. 

In  this  remote,  rocky,  and  barren  land  there  is 
an  essential  solitude,  which  nothing,  not  the  hotel, 
nor  the  coming  and  going  of  people  in  the  middle 
of  the  day,  can  disturb.  Whenever  I  get  right 
out  to  the  last  point  of  rocks,  where  one  looks 
straight  down,  as  if  between  walls  of  granite,  to  the 
always  white  and  chafing  water,  I  feel  at  once  alone 
and  secure,  like  a  bird  in  a  cleft  of  the  rock.  There 
is  the  restfulness  of  space,  the  noise  of  sea-birds 
and  the  sea,  and  nothing  else  but  silence.  The 
sea-gulls  cry  and  laugh  night  and  day ;  night  and 
day  you  hear  the  sea  crying  and  laughing ;  sails 
and  smoke  pass  on  the  sea,  this  side  and  that  side 
of  the  Longships  lighthouse,  which  stands,  beautiful 
and  friendly,  on  the  reef  in  the  water ;  and  along 
the  land,  at  morning  and  evening,  nothing  moves, 
all  is  waste,  wide,  and  silent.  Little  brown  donkeys 
start  up  among  the  rocks  as  you  walk  across  the 

267 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

cliffs  at  night ;  fat  slugs  lie  in  the  way  of  your 
feet,  black  and  burnished  as  coal ;  you  see  a 
vague  movement,  grey  upon  grey,  and  it  is  "the 
slow,  soft  toads,"  panting  and  leaping  upon  the 
stones. 

In  this  solitude,  away  from  the  people  of  cities, 
one  learns  to  be  no  longer  alone.  In  the  city  one 
loses  all  sense  of  reality  and  of  relationship.  We 
are  hedged  in  from  the  direct  agency  of  the  elements  ; 
we  are  hardly  conscious  of  the  seasons  but  for  their 
discomforts ;  we  are  in  the  midst  of  manufactured 
things,  and  might  forget  that  bread  grew  in  the 
ground  and  that  water  existed  except  in  pipes  and 
cisterns.  And  the  moment  we  leave  the  city  we 
come  to  remember  again  that  men  and  women  are 
not  alone  in  the  world,  but  have  countless  living 
creatures  about  them,  not  pets  nor  beasts  of  burden, 
and  with  as  much  right  to  the  earth  and  sunlight. 
First,  there  is  the  life  of  the  fields  and  the  farm- 
yards, a  life  attendant  on  ours,  but  familiar  with 
us  while  we  spare  it.  Then  there  is  the  unlimited 
life  of  birds,  who,  in  these  regions,  have  foothold 
in  the  sea  as  well  as  on  land,  and  have  two  provinces, 
of  water  and  of  air,  to  be  at  home  in.  And,  besides 
these,  there  is  the  tiny  restless  life  of  insects  :  the 
butterflies  that  live  for  the  day,  the  bees  with  their 
polished  mahogany  backs  and  soft  buzz  that  they 
call  here  "dummlederries,"  and  that  come  out  in 
the  evening,  the  toads  and  slugs  that  come  with 
the  first  dark,  and  the  glow-worms  that  light  their 
Httle  lonely  candle  of  pale  gold  at  night.  The 
268 


At  the  Land's  End. 

world  suddenly  becomes  full  of  living  beings,  whose 
apparent  happiness  we  are  glad  to  be  permitted  to 
share. 

In  this  air,  in  this  region,  an  air  of  dreams,  a 
region  at  once  formidable  and  mysterious,  every 
hour  of  the  day  has  its  own  charm  and  character, 
which  change  visibly  and  in  surprising  ways.  This 
morning  was  impenetrable  with  mist,  and  the  light- 
house guns  were  firing  until  an  hour  after  sunrise; 
greyness  blotted  out  the  whole  sea.  At  last  the 
brown  reef  of  the  lighthouse  could  be  distinguished, 
but  not  the  hghthouse ;  and  then,  suddenly,  as  one 
looked  away  and  looked  back  again,  there  was  a 
white,  shining  column,  hke  a  column  of  marble, 
glittering  through  the  mist.  As  I  started  to  walk 
along  the  cliffs  towards  the  Logan  Rock,  I  walked 
through  wet  vapours,  soft,  enveloping,  and  dehcious. 
The  mist  faded  and  returned,  showing  one,  in 
glimpses  and  under  dripping  veils,  headland  after 
headland,  rivaUing  each  other  in  boldness,  in  archi- 
tecture of  strangely  shaped  and  strangely  poised 
rocks,  bare,  spHntered,  crimped  at  the  edges,  cut 
into  ladders,  sheared  into  caverns,  sundered  by 
chasms,  heaped  crag  upon  crag  with  a  romantic 
splendour.  Now  and  then  the  path  dropped  to  a 
little  bay  of  white  sand,  and  in  the  fishing-creek  of 
Porthgwarra  I  met  a  little  ItaHan  boy  with  a  con- 
certina, who  was  quite  alone,  and  spoke  no  English, 
and  smiled  with  complete  happiness,  though  shyly, 
as  he  told  me  that   he  did  nothing,   nothing.     At 

269 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

St.  Levan  I  saw  the  little  church,  hidden  in  a  hollow, 
with  its  beautiful  and  elaborate  wood-carving,  a 
whole  monkish  symbolism  of  bold  fancy,  and,  in 
the  churchyard,  the  single  grave  where  the  frag- 
ments of  fifteen  men,  lost  in  the  Khyber,  had  been 
buried,  hands  and  feet  and  bones,  and  two  heads, 
and  one  whole  man,  a  Japanese ;  and,  near  the 
new  grave,  the  old  Levan  Stone  of  splintered 
granite,  with  grass  growing  in  the  gap,  of  which 
the  people  say : 

When,  with  panniers  astride 

A  pack-horse  can  ride 

Through  the  Levan  Stone, 

The  world  will  be  done. 

The  moorlands,  in  from  the  cliff,  are  all  desolate, 
covered  with  short  grass  and  heather,  strewn  with 
grey  rocks,  and  cut  into  square  patterns  by  stone 
hedges.  About  the  Logan  the  shapes  of  the  rocks 
become  less  grotesque,  seem  less  strangely  artificial ; 
and  the  Logan  point  is  Uke  a  house  of  rocks,  chamber 
beyond  chamber,  with  its  corridors,  doorways,  and 
windows. 

At  mid-day  I  liked  to  go  to  Sennen  Cove, 
because  the  sand  there  is  whiter  than  any  other 
sand,  and  the  green  slope  above  the  sand  more 
delicately  green,  and  the  water  bluer  and  more 
glownng.  At  high  tide  the  water  comes  in  with  a 
rejoicing  exuberance,  as  if  drawing  into  itself  all 
the  violence  of  the  sun.  It  is  exquisite,  on  a  breath- 
less July  day  about  noon,  to  lie  on  the  white  sand 
without  thought  or  memory,  an  animal  in  the  sun, 
270 


At  the  Land's  End. 

watching  the  painted  sea,  throbbing  with  heat, 
purple,  grape-coloured,  stained  with  the  shadows 
of  clouds  and  rocks ;  seeing  the  steamers  pass  as 
the  clouds  pass,  with  no  more  human  significance; 
curious  of  nothing  in  the  world  but  of  the  order 
and  succession  of  the  waves,  their  diligence,  and 
when  the  next  wave  \xi\\  obliterate  the  last  wave- 
mark. 

Twilight  comes  on  most  exquisitely,  I  think, 
over  the  cliffs  towards  Pardennick  (the  headland 
that  Turner  painted),  looking  down  on  Enys 
Dodman,  the  bare  brown  rock  sheared  off  and 
pierced  through  by  the  sea,  which  is  the  loudest 
home  of  sea-gulls  on  the  coast.  There  are  rocky 
headlands  to  right  and  left,  and  that  rock  in  the  sea 
which  they  call  the  Armed  Knight,  but  which  to 
me  seems  like  one  of  the  Rhine  castles,  stands 
there,  romantic  and  spectacular,  not  like  any  work 
of  nature.  Be\'ond,  with  the  t^^41ight-coloured  sea 
around  it,  is  the  hghthouse,  like  a  red  star  alighted 
on  a  pillar;  far  off,  the  golden  light  of  the  Wolf, 
and  the  two  hghts  of  Scilly.  The  sky,  where  the 
sun  has  gone  down,  is  barred  with  dark  lines  and 
half-obscured  outlines,  hke  the  outhnes  of  trees 
seen  in  some  shado^^y  mirror.  Faint  stains  of 
gold  and  green  and  pink  remain  in  the  sky,  still 
bright,  and  vet  softened  as  if  seen  through  water. 
Opposite,  the  moon  has  risen,  and  hangs  in  the  sky, 
round  and  white ;  the  sea  darkens  and  shines,  with 
strange  glimmerings  and  dim  banks  of  shadow, 
under    the    two    lights    from    east    and    from    west. 

271 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

There  is  one  boat  on  the  sea  :  I  see  the  two  brown 
sails,  and  their  shadows  in  the  water.  From  the 
island  of  the  sea-gulls  there  is  a  continual  barking 
and  chattering,  as  they  walk  to  and  fro,  or  stand 
and  shout  against  the  land.  The  rock  darkens, 
and  the  white  birds  shine  like  white  lilies  growing 
out  of  brown  earth.  The  castle  in  the  sea  turns 
black,  and  every  peak  and  spire  is  sharply  silhouetted 
upon  the  palely  gUttering  water.  Now  it  is  like 
a  magic  castle,  Klingsor's  perhaps ;  or  perhaps  the 
last  throne  and  ultimate  stronghold  of  the  night. 

Here  at  the  Land's  End  one  is  enveloped  by 
water.  The  hotel,  where  I  have  been  so  well  and 
so  quietly  served,  so  much  alone  when  the  brakes 
and  motors  do  not  come  in  to  spoil  some  of  the 
middle  hours  of  the  day,  is  built  on  the  farthest 
habitable  peak  of  land,  and  from  my  window  I 
looked  straight  down  into  the  sea,  which  I  could 
see  from  horizon  to  horizon.  Nothing  was  around 
me  but  naked  land,  nothing  in  front  of  me  but  a 
brief  foothold  of  rocky  cliff,  and  then  the  whole 
sea.  For  the  first  time  in  my  life  I  could  satiate 
my  eyes  with  the  sea. 

In  the  country,  between  the  grass  and  the  sky, 
one  may  taste  a  measure  of  happiness,  and  the  sight 
may  be  refreshed,  rested,  healed  of  many  evils. 
But  it  is  as  if  one  ate  good  food  without  drinking. 
There  is  a  thirst  of  sight  which  must  wait  unsatisfied 
until  the  eyes  drink  the  sea. 

Is  it  not  because  it  is  always  moving,  and  because 
272 


At  the  Land's  End. 

one  is  not  moving  with  it  that  the  sea  means  so  much 
more  to  one  than  any  possible  inland  scenery  ?  A 
tree,  a  meadow,  though  it  grows  and  changes,  grows 
and  changes  imperceptibly;  I  cannot  see  it  in 
motion :  it  seems  to  be  always  there,  irritatingly 
immobile.  But  the  sea  is  always  moving  past  me ; 
it  is  like  a  friend  who  comes  and  goes  and  is  faithful ; 
its  motion  is  all  I  have  to  give  me  some  sense  of 
permanency  in  a  world  where  all  things  grow  old 
and  pass  away,  except  the  sea.  Byron  was  right, 
though  he  spoke  pompously:  "Time  writes  no 
wrinkle  on  thine  azure  brow."  Every  part  of  the 
earth's  body  is  growing  old,  and  shows  the  signs 
and  scars  of  age ;  only  the  sea  is  without  that 
symptom  of  mortality,  and  remains  a  witness  to 
the  original  youth  of  creation. 

And  the  land  too,  here  has  in  it  something 
primeval.  On  this  height  one  seems  to  stand 
among  fragments  of  the  making  of  the  world ; 
and,  at  so  few  hundred  yards  from  the  hotel,  the 
tea-house,  the  picture  post-cards,  the  brakes,  and 
the  motors,  to  be  cut  off  from  all  these  things  by 
an  impregnable  barrier;  alone,  at  the  edge  of  the 
world,  with  the  immovable  rocks,  and  with  the  sea 
which  is  always  moving  and  never  removed. 

Summer )  1905. 


273 


Cornish  Sketches. 


I.   At   Fowey. 

As  I  entered  Fowey,  the  little  omnibus  turned  and 
twisted  through  streets  so  narrow  that  the  people 
had  sometimes  to  get  into  doorways  to  let  it  pass; 
it  plunged  downhill  and  climbed  uphill,  the  driver 
blowing  a  whistle  at  certain  points  to  clear  the  way ; 
I  caught,  in  passing,  glimpses  of  an  inch  or  two  of 
water  in  the  narrow  space  between  two  houses,  and 
came  out  finally  upon  a  high  terrace  from  which 
I  could  look  down  on  the  harbour  with  its  masts, 
the  exquisite  curve  of  Polruan  across  the  harbour, 
the  wedge  of  green  land,  dividing  the  two  branches 
of  the  river,  and  outward,  around  the  rocks,  the  sea 
itself.  There  was  not  a  breath  of  wind ;  the  sea 
lay  as  still  as  the  harbour;  the  afternoon  sun  filled 
the  air  with  dry  heat ;  some  yachts  were  coming 
in  slowly,  with  white  hulls  and  white  sails,  and  a 
Httle  boat  with  an  orange  sail  passed  close  to  the 
shore.  I  had  felt,  as  the  omnibus  twisted  in  the 
narrow  streets,  as  if  I  were  entering  Aries ;  but  the 
hills  and  valleys  were  new  to  me;  and  there  was 
something  at  once  new  and  yet  slightly  familiar  in 
this  southern  heat  on  a  little  town  of  old  houses, 
spread  out  along  the  side  of  a  hill  which  runs  sharply 
in  from  the  sea,  where  the  river  comes  down  to  make 
a  natural  harbour.  As  I  walked,  afterwards,  along 
the  roads,  at  that  height,  looking  down  on  the  sea 
through  trees  and  tall,  bright  flowers  and  green 
foliage,  I  could  have  fancied  myself  in  Naples, 
274 


Cornish  Sketches. 

walking  along  the  terrace-roads  at  Posilippo.  And 
the  air  was  as  mild  as  the  air  of  Naples  and  the  sea 
as  blue  as  the  sea  in  the  bay  of  Naples.  It  stretched 
away,  under  the  hot  sunlight,  waveless  to  the 
horizon,  scarcely  lapping  against  the  great  cliffs, 
covered  with  green  to  the  sea's  edge.  Trees  grew 
in  the  clefts  of  the  rock,  they  climbed  up  the  hill, 
covering  it  with  luxuriant  woods ;  deep  country 
lanes  took  one  inland,  and  the  butterflies  fluttered 
out  of  the  bushes  and  over  the  edge  of  the  cliff", 
where  they  met  the  sea-gulls,  coming  in  from  sea 
Hke  great  white  butterflies.  All  day  long  the  sea 
lay  motionless,  and  the  yachts  went  in  and  out  of 
the  harbour,  and  the  steam-tugs  brought  in  black, 
four-masted  ships  with  foreign  sailors,  and  the 
ferry-boat,  rowed  slowly  by  an  old  man,  crawled 
across  from  Fowey  to  Polruan  and  from  Polruan 
to  Fowey.  There  was  always,  in  those  slow,  sun- 
warmed  days,  a  sense  of  something  quiet,  unmoved, 
in  the  place;  and  yet  always  a  certain  movement 
on  the  water,  a  passing  of  ships,  a  passing  and  re- 
turning of  boats,  the  flight  of  sea-gulls  curving 
from  land  to  land. 

To  sit  at  an  open  window  or  in  the  garden  under 
an  awning,  and  to  look  down  on  all  this  moving 
quiet  was  enough  entertainment  for  day  or  night. 
I  felt  the  same  languid  sense  of  physical  comfort 
that  I  have  felt  on  the  coast  of  Spain,  with  the  same 
disinchnation  to  do  anything,  even  to  think,  with 
any  intentness.  The  air  was  full  of  sleep ;  the 
faint  noise  of  the  water  flapping  on  the  rocks,  the 

275 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

sound  of  voices,  of  oars,  something  in  the  dull 
brilliance  of  the  water,  like  the  surface  of  a  mirror, 
reflecting  all  the  heat  of  the  sky,  came  up  to  one 
drowsily ;  the  boats,  with  white  or  rusty  sails, 
passed  like  great  birds  or  moths  afloat  on  the  water. 
On  the  other  side,  over  against  me,  Polruan  lay 
back  in  the  arms  of  the  hill,  with  its  feet  in  the 
water ;  and  I  was  never  tired  of  looking  at  Polruan. 
It  seemed  not  so  much  to  have  been  made,  as  to 
have  grown  there,  like  something  natural  to  the 
rock,  all  its  houses  set  as  if  instinctively,  each  in 
its  own  corner,  with  all  the  symmetry  of  accident. 
It  nestled  into  the  harbour;  on  the  other  side  of 
the  hill  were  the  high  cliff's  and  the  sea. 

At  night,  looking  across  at  Polruan,  I  could  see 
a  long  dark  mass,  deep  black  under  the  shadow 
of  the  moon,  which  sharpened  the  outline  of  its 
summit  against  the  sky;  here  and  there  a  light  in 
some  window,  and  beyond,  to  the  right,  the  white 
glitter  of  the  sea.  The  harbour  was  partly  in  shadow 
near  the  further  shore,  and  the  masts  of  the  boats, 
each  with  its  little  yellow  light,  plunged  into  the 
water,  almost  motionless.  The  nearer  part  of  the 
river  was  bright,  like  the  sea,  and  glittered  under 
the  moon.  An  infinity  of  stars  clustered  together 
overhead.  I  could  hear,  if  I  listened,  a  very  faint 
ripple  against  the  rocks,  and  at  intervals  two  fishing- 
boats,  moored  together,  creaked  heavily. 

September  7,  1901. 
276 


Cornish  Sketches. 

11.  The   Cornish   Sea  :   Boscastle. 

You  might  pass  Boscastle  on  the  sea  and  not 
know  that  a  harbour  lay  around  a  certain  corner  of 
rocks.  This  twisting  way  in  from  the  sea  gives 
something  stealthy  to  the  aspect  of  the  place,  as  if 
a  secret  harbour  had  been  prepared  for  smugglers. 
Few  boats  go  in  or  out  there  now ;  rarely  a  pleasure- 
boat,  more  often  a  rowing-boat  on  its  way  to  the 
lobster-pots.  Green  hills  rise  up  steeply  on  both 
sides  of  the  harbour,  and  a  wooded  valley  follows 
the  course  of  the  little  river  flowing  between  them. 
The  village  is  built  around  a  single  long,  precipitous 
street,  which  winds  uphill  from  the  old  bridge  over 
the  river,  where  you  might  stand  looking  seawards, 
and  see  nothing  but  two  folding  arms  of  rock  that 
seem  to  overlap  and  make  a  barrier.  Beyond  the 
village  the  land  still  rises,  and,  looking  across  at 
it  from  the  cliffs,  it  seems  to  nestle  deep  into  the 
valley,  a  little  white  streak  in  the  midst  of  green 
fields  and  green  woods.  From  the  higher  part 
of  the  village  you  can  catch  glimpses  of  the  sea 
across  harvest  fields  or  beyond  Forrabury  Church 
with  its  brown  and  white  grave-stones. 

Boscastle  tantalises  one,  if  one  loves  the  sea  for 
its  own  sake,  by  the  height  at  which  it  sets  one 
above  the  water.  From  these  cliffs  one  sees,  seeming 
to  be  close  under  one,  the  whole  Atlantic;  only  it 
is  three  hundred  feet  below,  perhaps,  and  there  is 
not  a  beach  or  strip  of  sand  on  which  to  get  level 
with  it.     Here  and  there  are  rocks  on  which  it  is 

277 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

just  possible  to  clamber  down  at  low  tide;  there  is 
a  tiny  cove  or  two,  hard  to  reach  at  the  best  of  times, 
and  at  high  tide  under  water;  but  this  side  of 
Trebarwith,  which  is  a  couple  of  miles  beyond 
Tintagel,  only  a  single  sandy  bay.  Even  at  Trebar- 
with the  sand  is  covered  at  high  tide,  but  when 
the  water  is  out  there  is  a  long  broad  road  of  yellow 
sand,  leading  from  the  low  rocks  at  one  end  of  the 
bay  to  the  caverns  in  the  high  rocks  at  the  other  end 
of  the  bay.  On  a  hot  almost  still  day,  the  waves, 
coming  towards  the  shore  in  long  thin  hnes  white 
with  foam,  are  blown  into  fine  dust  as  they  curve 
over.  Seen  from  the  sand,  they  can  be  watched 
at  more  stages  of  their  movement  than  from  the 
cliffs,  where  one  gets  only  the  final  leap  at  the 
rocks. 

At  Boscastle  the  sea  is  almost  always  in  move- 
ment, tossing  restlessly,  leaping  at  the  rocks,  whiten- 
ing around  them,  flecked  here  and  there  with  white, 
and  the  whole  sea  moves,  as  if  the  depths  under  it 
moved  too.  Even  when  there  is  not  wind  enough 
to  ridge  the  water  into  separate  waves,  some  energy 
seems  to  shoulder  up  through  the  surface  and  push 
for  shore.  When  the  wind  urges  it,  it  heaves  into 
great  billows,  that  rise  up  green  and  tilt  over  with 
a  little  burst  of  white,  and  roll  one  over  another 
towards  the  shore,  and  as  they  come  into  a  space 
of  curdling  foam,  curdle,  and  turn  to  foam,  and 
leap  suddenly  at  the  rocks,  and  hammer  at  them 
with  a  loud  voluminous  softness,  and  fall  back  hke 
a  blown  cataract,  every  drop  distinct  in  the  sunlight. 
278 


Cornish  Sketches. 

It  is  as  if  a  dome  of  whiteness  sprang  into  the  air 
and  fell  over  with  a  crash  of  all  its  architecture  of 
bubbles.  Sometimes  two  columns  of  foam  meet  in 
the  air,  and  pass  through  one  another  hke  a  ghost 
through  a  ghost.  Sometimes  a  great  wave  springs 
higher  at  the  rocks,  seems  to  take  hold  there,  and 
then  falls  back,  broken  into  spray,  while  the  rock 
streams  steadily;  and  then,  after  a  pause,  a  thin 
white  smoke-drift,  incredibly  thin  and  white,  like 
the  reflection  of  smoke  in  a  glass,  is  blown  far  out 
from  some  corner  or  crevice  in  the  rock  that  had 
sucked  the  water  deep  into  it. 

I  am  content  to  sit  on  the  rocks,  as  near  as  I  can 
to  the  water,  and  watch  a  few  feet  of  sea  for  an  hour 
together.  There  is  enough  entertainment  in  its 
recurrent  and  changing  violence  and  stealthiness  of 
approach,  its  unexhausted  and  unnumbered  varieties 
of  attack,  the  foam  and  disappointment  of  its  foiled 
retreats.  Form  and  colour  change  at  every  instant, 
and,  if  they  return  again,  one  is  not  conscious  of 
the  repetition.  I  suppose  many  waves  are  identical 
out  of  the  infinite  number  of  waves  which  break 
on  any  point  of  shore.  But  some  happy  accident 
of  wind  or  tide  or  sunlight  seems  always  to  bring 
in  its  own  variation. 

At  sunset  the  sea  warms  and  lightens  into  strange 
colours.  As  the  sun  goes  down  in  a  ball  of  intense 
fire,  the  round  seems  to  flatten  itself  out  to  a  long, 
glowing  bar,  scorching  the  sea  under  it ;  a  pale 
sunset  leaves  the  sea  chill,  grey,  uncoloured.  The 
shadow  of  golden  fire  in  the  sky  turns  it  to  lavender ; 

279 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

a  sunset  of  paler  fire  burnishes  it  into  glittering  steel, 
or  it  lies  like  a  steel  mirror  misted  by  a  breath. 
Every  sunset  here  is  a  marvel,  and  the  sea  is  a  shining 
floor  on  which  the  marvel  is  built  up.  I  remember 
a  particular  sunset  after  a  day  on  which  the  rain  had 
poured  continuously;  the  sun  sank  slowly  behind 
wet  and  shining  clouds,  through  which  it  shone 
like  a  light  in  a  crystal.  These  white  clouds  rose 
out  of  the  sea,  and  their  peaked  and  jagged  upper 
edges  gradually  shone  into  bright  gold  as  the  sun 
sank  lower  behind  them.  Above,  between  them 
and  the  darker  clouds  still  swollen  with  rain,  a 
horizontal  bar  of  gold  glittered  more  faintly;  and 
across  the  darker  clouds  a  mist  of  rosy  fire  began  to 
drift  away,  flushed  softly  Hke  the  feathers  of  a 
flaming  wing;  and  this  rosy  mist  floated  onwards 
until  it  came  to  the  edge  of  the  furthest  rain-clouds, 
and  drooped  over  a  space  of  pale  green  sky,  clear, 
luminous,  and  transparent.  The  sea  was  the 
colour  of  lilac  deepening  into  rose,  and  it  lay  like 
a  field  of  heather  washed  by  the  rain,  when  the  sun 
shines  into  every  rain-drop. 

There  is  a  point  at  Trevalga  where  I  like  to  look 
along  the  shore  as  it  bends  in  an  irregular  curve, 
rising  sharply  out  of  the  water  in  a  series  of  torn 
and  uneven  crags,  with,  at  some  interval,  the  two 
high  and  steep  rocks  which  rise  up  out  of  the  sea 
some  hundreds  of  yards  away  from  the  land,  from 
which  they  had  once  been  rent.  The  sea  washes 
around  the  rocks  and  against  the  bases  of  the  cliffs 
as  far  as  the  distant,  smoother  line  of  coast  towards 
280 


Cornish  Sketches. 

Bude,  where  the  Cornish  wildness  dies  away,  and 
it  Hes  out  towards  the  sky  as  far  as  the  eye  can  fol- 
low it,  an  infinite  space  of  unwearied  water.  Seen 
from  a  lower  point,  the  cliffs  are  mountainous,  and 
stand  often  against  the  sky  like  a  mountain  crowned 
by  a  castle.  Tall  cliffs  covered  to  nearly  the  sea's 
edge  by  short  grass  and  heather  are  indented  by 
gullies,  hollowed  out  of  their  very  substance,  and 
opening  on  the  sea  through  a  narrow  and  cornered 
entrance.  The  whole  land  seems  to  have  been 
sheared  into  and  sliced  away  at  frequent  intervals, 
and  the  colour  of  the  rock  varies  in  each,  from  slate 
to  deep  black.  For  the  most  part  the  rocks  are 
made  up  of  layers  of  slate,  shale  above  shale,  and 
they  are  cracking  away  and  crumbling  over  con- 
tinually; the  sea  picks  at  their  bases,  and  hollows 
out  caves  and  holes  and  niches ;  they  stand  straight 
up  out  of  the  sea,  still  impregnable,  like  great  walls, 
black  and  jagged,  and  veined  with  yellow  marble, 
and  patched  here  and  there  with  streaks  of  living 
green.  They  stand  highest  at  Beeny  High  Cliff, 
a  sheer  wall  of  blackness,  and  St.  Gennys,  which 
rises  less  abruptly  to  a  higher  point.  To  the  south- 
west one  can  see  the  wavering  line  of  the  coast  as 
far  as  Trevose  Head  ;  to  the  north-east  a  less  rugged 
line  of  cliffs  curves  into  tiny  bays,  each  with  its 
handful  of  grey  sand,  as  far  as  the  point  of  Cambeak. 
Bracken  growing  intermingled  with  yellow  gorse 
gives  colour  to  a  wild  expanse  of  green  moorland ; 
the  steep  grey  cliffs  rise  to  the  moorland  out  of  a 
sea  which  should  be  seen,  as  I  have  seen  it,  not  less 

281 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

desolately  grey,  with  a  grey  sky  overhead.  There 
was  a  bitter  wind  blowing,  which  caught  at  one 
furiously  as  one  came  to  the  edge  of  the  cliflF.  As 
the  sun  sank  lower,  it  began  to  scorch  the  dark 
clouds  about  it,  shrivelling  their  edges  ragged; 
it  went  down  into  the  sea  rapidly,  half  hidden 
behind  the  clouds ;  and  the  sea  darkened  to  a  sullen 
colour,  as  of  molten  lead,  that  spread  gradually 
over  its  whole  surface.  A  vivid  and  stormy  dark- 
ness hung  overhead,  weighing  heavily  on  land  and 
sea.  Down  below  the  sea  roared  with  a  loud  and 
continuous  noise.  There  was  something  disquieting 
in  the  air,  in  the  aspect  of  things.  Long  after  the 
sun  had  gone  down  into  the  water  a  bright  flame 
licked  up  the  lowest  edge  of  sky,  and  ran  there,  as 
I  walked  homewards,  like  travelling  fire  behind  the 
bushes  and  tree-trunks. 

September  14,  1901. 


III.  The  Cornish  Coast. 

I  wonder  if  there  is  any  form  of  the  mere  accept- 
ance of  happiness,  more  perfect,  more  explicit 
than  that  which  I  have  been  enjoying  until  some 
uneasy  energy  within  drives  me  to  shatter  it  by 
analysis  ?  I  have  been  lying  back  on  a  high  clifF 
between  Kennack  Bay  and  Cadgwith,  on  a  bed  of 
grass  and  heather,  with  my  back  against  a  rock 
warmed  by  the  sun ;  the  sun's  shadow,  as  it  sets, 
282 


Cornish  Sketches. 

is  slowly  creeping  over  the  grass  at  my  feet ;  there 
is  a  slight  breeze,  which  I  can  just  feel  on  my  cheek, 
but  which  is  not  nimble  enough  to  stir  the  sea  into 
more  than  a  faint  criss-cross  of  lines,  which  melt 
into  one  another  before  the  eye  has  distinguished 
one  from  the  other,  and  go  on  wavering,  level  to 
the  horizon.  Two  white  sails  flicker  near  the  shore ; 
further  out  there  are  ships  with  white  sails,  a  long 
dark  steamer,  and,  almost  on  the  horizon,  a  thin 
dark  trail  of  smoke.  Sea-gulls  bark  over  my  head 
and  laugh  in  their  throats,  as  they  sail  on  level 
wings,  the  dark  tips  feeling  their  way  in  the  sea  of 
air  like  the  rudders  of  white  ships.  The  waves 
flash  on  the  rocks  below,  with  a  gentle  and  sleepy 
sound,  and  I  can  hear  nothing  else  except  that 
rustle  which  the  wind  makes  in  the  ferns  and  bracken 
as  it  passes  over  them. 

If  I  lift  my  head  and  look  to  the  right  I  see  the 
southern  point  of  the  Lizard,  with  its  white  telegraph 
poles ;  if  I  look  to  the  left  I  see  the  deep  curve  and 
long  straight  hne  of  the  cliff's  ending  far  out  at 
Black  Head.  Looking  inland,  I  can  see  nothing 
but  varying  levels  and  varying  shades  of  green, 
with  darker  trees  in  lines  and  clusters  against  the 
sky,  beyond  the  fields  and  the  downs.  But  if  I  he 
still  and  do  not  raise  or  turn  my  head,  I  have  enough 
for  my  pleasure  in  looking  straight  across  the  sea 
to  the  sky,  letting  sails  or  sea-gulls  or  clouds  pass 
like  illusions  of  movement  in  a  world  which  has 
become  stationary  and  which  flows  continually 
past  me,  as  my  eyes  rest  on  the  motionless  diamond- 

283 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

like  barrier  of  the  sky  and  on  the  moving  and 
changeless  grey-blue  pavement  of  the  sea. 

The  sea,  alone  of  natural  things,  obeys  Aristotle's 
law  in  art,  that  for  perfect  pleasure  there  must  be 
continual  slight  variety.  It  has  the  monotony  of 
great  art,  and  its  continual  slight  variety.  Every- 
thing else  in  nature  wearies  one  by  its  stillness  or 
its  restlessness ;  by  a  limit  which  suggests  constraint 
or  by  an  open  bareness  which  is  but  lawless  and 
uncultured.  But  here  the  eye  travels  easily  on  to 
heaven ;  there  is  only  that  diamond  barrier  of  sky 
between  it  and  the  end  of  the  world.  And  the 
world  itself  seems  no  longer  to  have  a  limit ;  and, 
by  these  gentle  degrees,  infinity  itself  loses  its 
horror.  Only,  as  I  lie  here,  I  think  none  of  these 
thoughts,  which  are  but  after-thoughts  in  the  wake 
of  sensation,  and  perhaps  explain  nothing ;  and  in 
my  acceptance  of  happiness  I  am  hardly  even  con- 
scious that  to  be  thus,  in  body  and  mind,  is  to  be 
perfectly  happy. 

If  I  could  choose  a  place  to  build  a  cottage, 
where  I  could  come  and  live  when  I  wanted  to  be 
alone,  a  place  for  work  and  dreams,  I  would  choose 
Kennack  Bay,  because  there  the  land  mingles  more 
happily  with  the  sea  and  the  rocks  with  the  sand, 
and  the  cliffs  with  the  moorland  than  anywhere 
that  I  know  in  England.  All  along  the  coast  here, 
from  Kennack  to  the  Lizard  and  from  the  Lizard 
to  MuUion,  there  is  little  that  has  been  spoilt  by 
modern  progress,  little  of  the  fretfulness,  pretence, 
and  vulgar  crowding  of  so  much  of  the  English 
284 


Cornish  Sketches. 

sea-coast.  Fortunately  Cornwall  is  a  long  way 
from  London,  half  hidden  in  the  sea,  at  the  very 
end  of  the  land,  and  the  poisonous  trail  of  the  rail- 
way has  not  yet  gone  all  over  it.  Here  there  is 
not  a  railway  within  ten  miles.  There  is  valley, 
moorland,  and  cliff;  the  smell  of  heather  mingles 
with  the  sea-smell,  and  the  cornfields  go  down 
green  and  golden  to  the  sea.  If  one  goes  inland, 
roads  wind  up  and  down  between  deep  hedges, 
and,  as  one  comes  to  the  top  of  a  hill,  in  the  moment 
before  one  goes  down  on  the  other  side,  there  is  a 
glimpse  of  the  sea  between  the  branches  of  trees, 
or  coming  blue  and  shining  into  a  frame  of  meadow 
and  cliffside.  Following  the  whited  stones  of  the 
coastguards,  one  can  trace  the  whole  coast-line,  on 
narrow  paths  high  above  the  sea  and  across  the  sand 
or  pebbles  of  coves.  And  there  is  not  a  cliff  where 
one  cannot  lie  down  and  be  alone,  and  smell  salt 
and  honey,  and  watch  the  flight  of  the  sea-gulls, 
and  listen  to  the  sea,  and  be  very  idly  happy. 

Yet,  to  me,  Kennack  is  the  most  restful  and 
beautiful  corner  of  the  coast  and  the  most  enviable 
to  live  in.  Not  long  ago  there  was  a  plot  against 
its  peace,  and  a  gang  of  company-promoters  had 
schemed  to  build  a  big  hotel  there,  and  the  plans 
were  made,  and  only  the  formality  of  buying  the 
piece  of  land  remained.  What  happened  is  what 
still  happens  in  these  parts,  where  Cornish  gentlemen 
still  own  and  still  keep  their  incomparable  share  of 
Cornish  land.  The  plot  was  scattered  by  a  brief, 
irrevocable    letter    from    Lord    Falmouth's    agent, 

285 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  the  company-promoters  were  left  gasping  at 
the  modern  anomaly  of  a  landowner  who  would  not 
part  with  his  land  for  a  profit. 

And  the  people,  too,  in  their  measure,  help  the 
land  owners  to  keep  Cornwall  for  the  Cornish. 
They  do  not  encourage  strangers ;  they  are  not  at 
the  beck  and  call  of  every  one  with  a  purse  in  his 
pocket ;  they  reserve  their  opinions  and  their 
independence.  There  is  a  motor-car  now  running 
between  Helston,  where  the  railway  ends,  and  the 
Lizard,  where  the  land  itself  ends  in  the  Atlantic. 
The  people  about  here  say  that  the  motor-car  is 
doing  them  more  harm  than  good  :  it  is  destroying 
their  roads,  raising  their  rates,  and  disturbing  their 
peace  and  quiet.  They  have  no  keen  desire  to 
make  more  money  or  to  change  the  conditions 
under  which  their  fathers  have  lived.  In  the  hands 
of  such  landowners  and  of  such  tenants  is  not  part 
at  least  of  Cornwall  still  safe  ?  . 

August  27,  1904. 

IV.    St.  Levan. 

On  the  way  from  the  Land's  End  to  the  Logan 
Rock,  just  in  from  the  clilF,  after  you  have  passed 
Tol-Pedn,  and  immediately  before  the  road  drops 
to  Porthgwarra,  there  is  a  little  valley,  a  big  grassy 
nook,  with  one  cottage,  a  rectory,  and  a  church. 
This  is  the  Parish  Church  of  St.  Levan,  a  fisherman 
saint  of  whom  there  are  many  legends ;  his  path  is 
286 


Cornish  Sketches. 

still  seen  by  the  track  of  greener  grass  that  leads 
out  to  the  rocks  named  after  him,  where  he  fished 
the  traditional  *'chack-cheeld"  chad.  There  is 
his  stone,  too,  in  the  churchyard,  one  of  those 
ominous  stones  which,  in  Cornwall,  are  thought  to 
be  the  dials  of  Time  itself,  chroniclers  of  the  hour 
of  the  Last  Judgment.  The  Levan  stone  is  a  rock 
of  granite,  spht  in  two,  with  grass  and  ferns  growing 
in  the  gap  between  the  two  halves.  The  end  of 
the  world  will  come,  says  the  rhyme,  when  the  gap 
is  wide  enough  for  a  pack-horse  with  panniers  to 
pass  through.  "We  do  nothing  to  hasten  it," 
the  rector  said  to  me  reassuringly. 

All  that  you  can  see  of  the  church  until  you  are 
quite  close  to  it  are  the  four  pinnacles  of  its  squat 
tower,  like  the  legs  and  castors  of  an  arm-chair 
turned  upside  down.  It  is  hidden  away  in  its 
hollow,  out  of  the  wind  which  is  always  coming  and 
going  on  the  wildest  cliffs  in  Cornwall.  Boulders 
piled  with  a  sort  of  solid  ricketiness  on  one  another's 
shoulders  (so  old  and  grey  and  flighty!)  climb 
the  cliffside  out  of  the  sea,  or  stand  propped  and 
buttressed,  holding  on  to  the  shelving  edges  of 
green  land.  Some  are  bare,  some  clothed  with 
lichen  as  with  a  delicate  green  fur,  and  they  lie 
about  in  fantastic  attitudes,  as  if  they  had  been  flung 
together  in  the  games  of  giants,  and  then  forgotten 
for  a  few  centuries.  There  is,  in  these  clusters  of 
vast  rocks,  that  '*  delight  in  disorder"  which 
Herrick  knew  in  petty  and  lovely  things;  only 
here  it  is  on  the  scale  of  giants.     The  pale  colours 

287 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

of  the  lichen  soften  what  might  otherwise  be  harshly 
jagged,  rounding  the  edges  and  dressing  the  naked- 
ness of  the  rocks.  And  the  air,  in  which  the  scent 
of  heather  and  gorse  and  thyme  mingles  with  the 
salt  smell  of  the  sea,  is  tempered  and  made  more 
exquisite  by  the  drifting  mists  and  vapours  which 
come  up  out  of  the  sea  like  a  ghostly  presence,  and 
blot  out  headland  after  headland,  as  by  a  soft 
enchantment. 

Inland  there  is  barren  moor,  with  here  and  there 
a  scanty  plot  of  herbage ;  and  the  moorland  is  all 
patterned  out  into  squares  and  oblongs  by  the  stone 
hedges  which  mark  each  man's  property,  little 
properties  of  gorse,  grass,  stones,  and  perhaps  a 
patch  of  heather,  meaningless  as  nought  without 
a  cipher,  but  held  jealously  from  father  to  son. 
The  skylarks  have  their  nests  in  this  rocky  ground, 
and  you  hear  them  singing  in  the  air  their  ecstatic 
hymns  to  light,  while,  below  them,  the  sea-gulls 
drift  to  and  fro  between  land  and  sea,  crying  their 
harsh  and  melancholy  and  complaining  cry,  the 
voice  of  restlessness,  the  voice  of  the  restlessness 
of  water. 

It  is  in  the  midst  of  this  eager  and  barren  world, 
where  only  a  few  fishers  live  here  and  there  in  the 
creeks  and  coves,  that  the  little  church  is  hidden 
away  in  its  green  nook,  like  a  relic  of  other  ages. 
It  is  built  in  the  Late  Perpendicular  style,  and  has 
fine  heavy  pillars,  painted  beams  in  the  roof,  an 
early  font  of  some  green  granite,  unknown  in 
Cornwall.  But  it  is  chiefly  for  its  carved  woodwork 
288 


Cornish  Sketches. 

that  the  church  is  notable.  The  screen,  carved 
thickly  to  the  very  beads  of  the  mouldings,  contains 
a  whole  homily  in  wood,  a  minute  system  of  Catholic 
symbolism,  in  which  the  spiritual  history  of  the 
world  from  the  Creation  to  the  Passion  is  imaged. 
There  are  the  legged  snakes  of  the  first  Eden,  fiery 
flying  serpents,  symbols  of  the  Trinity,  the  pelican, 
the  Virgin's  lily,  the  eagle  of  St.  John;  the  sacred 
monogram  is  repeated  continually,  and  there  are 
the  nail,  the  hammer,  the  spear,  all  the  instruments 
of  the  Crucifixion ;  and  there  is  an  effigy  of  the 
Virgin,  who  is  represented  with  a  foolish  round  face, 
coiff^ed  hair,  necklace,  and  ruff',  like  a  fine  lady  of 
the  period.  The  carvings  on  the  ends  of  the  pews 
are  less  naive,  more  skilful.  There  are  the  two 
fishes  of  St.  Levan;  the  two  cocks  that  crowed  in 
answer  to  one  another  when  St.  Peter  denied  his 
Master;  there  is  a  palmer,  with  a  cockle-shell  (on 
his  hat ;  there  are  knights  and  ladies,  fierce  heathen, 
and  there  are  two  jesters.  One  of  the  jesters  is 
supposed  to  typify  Good,  because  he  looks  to  the 
east  smilingly,  holding  his  cap  and  bells  and  ladle; 
while  the  other  typifies  Evil,  because  he  turns  his 
back  on  the  altar,  and  holds  askew  a  bishop's  cro- 
zier  with  an  ass's  hoof  for  crook.  All  are  carved 
patiently  and  hvingly  by  carvers  to  whom  the  work 
was  part  of  religion.  "The  soul  of  a  man  is  in  it," 
said  the  rector. 

The  learned  and  kindly  rector  told  me,  among 
many  stories  of  his  lonely  parish,  that  there  had  been 
a  rector  once  whose  wits  were  none  of  the  soundest, 

289 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and,  as  they  were  liable  to  come  and  go  with  violence, 
he  would  be  chained  to  his  lectern  when  it  was 
thought  they  were  likely  to  leave  him,  so  that  he 
might  read  the  Lessons  without  danger  to  his 
congregation.  In  Cornwall  madness  is  no  un- 
common thing,  and,  like  deformity,  is  looked  on 
kindly.  Most  villages  have  their  village  idiot,  or 
one  of  those  large-skulled  dwarfs  who  trudge  pain- 
fully along  the  lanes  with  aged  faces. 

August  19,  1905. 

V.  The  Colours  of  Cornwall. 

The  postman  comes  to  me  once  a  morning  from 
Ruan  Minor,  and  asks  if  I  have  any  letters  to  be 
posted.  If  I  go  into  the  little  shop  of  all  sorts, 
which  is  the  post  office  as  well,  half  an  hour  before 
post  time,  I  find  him  helping  to  sort  the  letters 
behind  the  grocery  counter.  Ruan  Minor  is  a 
village  without  a  street.  Most  of  the  cottages 
are  built  by  the  roadside,  some  turn  aside  from  the 
road,  along  lanes  of  their  own,  and  are  built  cross- 
wise or  around  corners,  to  suit  the  natural  angles. 
Almost  all  are  thatched,  and  have  flower  gardens 
in  front  and  creepers  up  the  wall.  One  cottage 
is  built  of  corrugated  iron,  which  is  almost  hidden 
by  trails  of  purple  clematis.  There  is  only  one 
shop  besides  the  post  office,  though  the  shoemaker 
and  the  blacksmith  and  the  carpenter  have  each  a 
shanty.  There  is  a  church,  and  there  are  two 
290 


Cornish  Sketches. 

chapels ;  but  there  is  not  a  pubhc-house  in  the 
village. 

The  cottage  where  I  am  staying  is  down  in  the 
valley,  and  to  get  to  it  you  must  go  down  an  in- 
credibly steep  and  winding  hill.  I  have  once  seen 
a  horse  and  cart  go  up  that  hill ;  I  have  never  seen 
one  come  down.  If  you  stop  half-way,  where  there 
is  a  cottage,  and  look  across  under  the  branches  of 
the  trees,  you  will  see  a  triangular  patch  of  blue  sea, 
and,  forming  one  side  of  the  triangle,  the  high 
straight  cliflPs  going  out  to  Pedn  Boar.  Between  you 
and  the  water  there  is  a  high  rocky  croft,  and  when 
you  go  down  into  the  valley  you  will  see  nothing 
but  steep  walls  of  green  on  all  sides,  which  seem  at 
night  to  be  built  half-way  to  the  stars,  shutting  out 
the  sea  and  the  winds,  and  sheltering  the  valley. 

On  the  hill  behind  the  cottage  there  is  another 
village,  Kuggar,  or,  as  the  people  call  it,  Kigger. 
It  is  smaller  than  Ruan  Minor,  and  has  no  post 
office,  only  a  pillar-box,  which  is  cleared  once  a 
day ;  no  shop  and  no  church.  A  steep  road  passes 
through  it  which  leads  down  to  Kennack  Bay, 
winding  between  low  hedges ;  on  the  further  side 
there  is  another  valley,  with  sloping  corn-fields, 
scarred  by  waste  rocky  places  which  no  plough  can 
pass  over,  and  green  meadows  where  cattle  graze ; 
and  then,  beyond  the  first  stretch  of  sand,  yet 
another  valley,  like  a  hollow  cut  out  of  the  solid 
earth,  and  now  grown  over  with  a  soft  multitude 
of  trees  and  gorse  and  heather,  which  rise  into 
rocks  and  drop  to  a  stream  flowing  between  reeds 

291 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

on  the  edge  of  the  sand.  Beyond,  in  the  eastern 
bay,  there  is  another  valley,  and  then  the  cliffs 
begin,  and  go  on  across  rocky  plains  of  heather  to 
Coverack,  where  they  turn  bare,  and  so  on  to 
Pedn  Boar  and  Black  Head.  The  coast  here, 
seen  from  Kennack,  is  at  once  violent  and  soft,  at 
once  wild  and  placid,  with  its  broad  outlines  and 
delicacy  of  detail,  the  variety  of  its  colour,  form, 
and  mingled  rock  and  pasturage.  Here  things  are 
constantly  falling  into  pictures ;  nature  here,  though 
opulent,  is  by  no  means  indiscriminate.  And  it  is 
this  touch  of  reticence,  this  fine  composition,  this 
natural  finesse,  that  saves  a  country  so  picturesque 
from  the  reproach  of  an  obvious  picturesqueness  : 
these  soft  gradations,  this  mastery  of  fine  shades, 
nature's  surprising  tact  in  refraining  from  her 
favourite  effects  of  emphasis. 

If,  instead  of  turning  to  the  right  as  you  go 
through  Kuggar,  you  turn  to  the  left  and  follow 
a  flat  road  going  inland,  you  will  come  out  presently 
upon  the  downs.  The  road  divides  by  the  double 
cottage  where  the  four  dogs  sit  in  their  four  barrels 
under  the  signpost ;  one  way  will  take  you  across 
the  downs  to  Mullion  or  the  Lizard,  and  the  other 
way  will  take  you  to  Helston,  or,  if  you  turn  aside 
from  it,  to  a  multitude  of  places  with  strange  names, 
Constantine,  Bosahan,  or  St.  Anthony  in  Meneage. 
There  is  a  walk  from  Gillan  Creek,  by  the  quaint 
little  church  of  St.  Anthony,  along  the  edge  of  the 
clifF  to  Helford,  which,  in  its  mingling  of  sea  and 
river  and  forest,  its  rocks  and  sandy  coves  and 
292 


Cornish  Sketches. 

luxuriant  vegetation,  is  unlike  anything  I  have  seen 
in  England.  Leaving  Dennis  Head,  from  which 
you  can  see  Falmouth  across  the  curve  of  the  sea, 
and  following  the  broad  Helford  River  by  the 
rabbit-warrens,  you  go,  by  a  public  path,  along  the 
margin  .  of  the  grounds  of  Bosahan,  where  woods 
carpeted  with  ferns  come  down  to  the  sea's  edge,  and 
narrow  paths  lead  up  between  clustering  hydrangeas 
and  exotic  plants  and  grasses  and  tall  bamboos,  which 
grow  there  exuberantly,  as  if  in  their  native  soil. 

I  am  never  tired  of  walking  and  driving  across 
the  downs,  though  they  are  empty  of  shape,  except 
where  a  barrow  heaves  them  or  a  pool  lies  among 
reeds  by  the  roadside.  They  are  coloured  with 
the  white  and  purple  of  heather  and  with  the  yellow 
of  gorse,  and  a  wind  from  the  sea  passes  over  them 
and  goes  on  to  the  sea.  You  can  see  the  sea  towards 
Cadgwith  on  one  side  of  Cornwall  and  the  Marconi 
posts  at  Mullion  on  the  other  side  of  Cornwall. 
And  at  night  there  are  marvellous  sunsets,  filling 
the  whole  breadth  of  the  sky  and  building  up 
delicate  patterns  there,  in  colours  like  the  colours 
of  flowers  transfigured  by  light. 

It  is  for  its  colour,  largely,  that  I  love  Cornwall, 
and  wherever  you  walk,  on  moorland,  croft,  meadow, 
or  cHffside,  there  is  a  continual  soft  insistence  and 
alternation  of  colour.  On  the  downs  the  heather 
grows  sparely,  and  is  less  like  a  carpet  of  Eastern 
weaving  than  on  the  cliffs  beyond  Kennack,  where 
one's  feet  tread  upon  colours  and  scents,  and  all  the 
ground  is  in  bloom.     Grey  rocks  come  up  amongst 

293 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

these  soft  coverings,  and  go  down,  tufted  with  the 
elastic  green  and  faint  yellow  of  samphire  into  the 
sea ;  and  the  rocks  are  spotted  with  lichen  of  violent 
gold,  which  is  almost  orange.  Everywhere  there 
is  the  sharp  white  of  cottage  walls  and  the  gentle 
browns  and  greys  of  thatch ;  flowers  of  all  colours 
swarm  against  the  whitewash,  and  creepers  catch 
at  the  eaves  and  nod  in  at  the  windows  —  red,  white, 
purple,  and  yellow.  White  sea-gulls  with  their 
brown  young  ones  fly  out  over  the  water  in  circles ; 
cormorants  sit  like  black  weather-cocks,  each  on  a 
solitary  point  of  rock;  inland,  the  crows  cut  black 
patterns  on  the  sky ;  the  grey  sandpipers  run  over 
the  grey  sand.  And  there  are  the  many  colours 
of  sand,  sulphurous  and  salmon-coloured  rocks, 
painted  rocks,  with  all  the  intricate  colourings  of 
serpentine ;  and  there  is  the  sea,  with  its  warm  blue, 
when  it  seems  almost  human,  and  its  chill  green, 
when  it  seems  fairy,  and  its  white  foam  of  delight, 
and  the  misery  of  its  grey  dwindling  away  into  mist. 
Autumn  is  beginning :  the  bracken  is  shrivelling 
brown,  and  the  heather  darkening,  and  the  gorse 
drying  to  dust  and  flowering  yellow,  and  the  grasses 
withering,  and  the  leaves  of  the  trees  yellowing 
and  falling.  The  corn  has  all  been  carried,  and 
stands,  golden  beside  the  pale  hay,  in  great  solemn 
ricks  in  the  farmyards.  All  the  green  things  of 
the  earth  begin  to  brighten  a  little  before  they  fade. 

October  8,  1904. 

294 


In  a  Northern  Bay. 


I  HAVE  only  seen  the  bay  when  the  sea  has  been 
gentle,  at  the  most  whitening  a  little  against  the 
yellow  sand,  into  a  sliding  pattern  like  white  lace. 
At  sunrise,  a  steel  mirror,  coloured  at  sunset  with 
more  sombre  lights,  half  deep  shadow  and  half 
chilled  into  whiteness  under  moonlight,  the  sea 
lies  there  before  one,  filHng  one's  eyes,  as  if  there 
were  nothing  else  in  the  world  but  changing  and 
unchangeable  water.  Between  the  sea  and  the  low 
bank  on  which  the  village  has  grouped  itself,  there 
is  a  narrow  strip  of  sand,  ending  on  one  side  in  a 
curve  of  rocks  and  a  sandy  clifF,  and  on  the  other 
in  a  little  rocky  point  running  out  into  the  sea,  with 
its  old  church,  its  few,  huddled  cottages,  the  fishing- 
boats  drawn  up  against  it.  Half-way  along  the 
naked  ribs  of  a  wreck  clutch  the  sand,  where  a 
storm  drove  them  deep  into  it.  Cobles  He  eagerly 
on  the  sand,  with  their  delicately  curved  keels, 
waiting,  like  impatient  horses,  to  race  into  the  sea. 
Beyond  the  point  lie  miles  of  green  moorland,  along 
which  you  can  follow  the  sea  into  other  bays,  which  it 
does  but  drift  into  and  drift  out  of,  indifferent  to 
the  land,  which  has  here  no  hold  upon  it,  as  it  seems 
to  stretch  out  ineffectual  arms. 

Between  the  house  and  the  sea  there  is  only  a 
slope  of  grass  and  the  narrow  beach.  The  little 
world  of  the  place  passes  to  and  fro  under  our  eyes 
along  the  narrow  beach ;  the  fishing-boats  and  the 
yachts  go  out  over  the  sea ;  nothing  ever  changes ; 
there  are  always  the  same  faces  and  the  same  sails. 

295 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Only  the  sea  changes  continually,  like  music,  visible 
cadence  after  cadence.  One  seems  to  hve  with 
dulled  senses,  fantastically  awake  under  a  sort  of 
exterior  sleep,  as  if  hypnotised  by  the  sea.  There 
is  something  terrible  in  so  much  peace.  It  is 
impossible  that  any  one  could  be  so  sleepily  happy 
as  one  ought  to  be  here. 

The  sea  is  a  mirror,  not  only  to  the  clouds,  the 
sun,  the  moon,  and  the  stars,  but  to  all  one's  dreams, 
to  all  one's  speculations.  The  room  of  mirrors, 
in  which  the  Lady  of  Shalott  wove  her  fate,  is  but 
an  image  of  the  sea's  irresistible  imprisonment  of 
oneself  alone  with  oneself.  Reflections  enter  from 
without,  but  only  reflections,  and  these  too  are 
dimmed  into  the  shadowy  life  of  the  mirror.  The 
sea  tells  us  that  everything  is  changing  and  that 
nothing  ever  changes,  that  tides  go  out  and  return, 
that  all  existence  is  a  rhythm;  neither  calm  nor 
storm  breaks  the  rhythm,  only  hastens  or  holds  it 
back  for  a  moment ;  all  agitation  being  but  a  tempo 
ruhato.  Mountains  give  hope,  woods  a  kind  of 
mysterious  friendliness  with  the  earth,  but  the  sea 
reminds  us  that  we  are  helpless.  In  cities  we  can 
escape  thought,  we  can  deaden  feeling,  we  can 
forget  that  yesterday  mattered  or  that  to-morrow 
will  matter.  But  the  sea  has  no  compromises,  no 
evasions,  none  of  the  triviality  of  meadows  among 
which  we  can  be  petty  without  suffering  rebuke. 
The  sea  is  austere,  implacable,  indiflPerent ;  it  has 
nothing  to  tell  us ;  it  is  an  eternal  question.  It 
comes  seeming  to  offer  us  peace,  a  lullaby,  sleep; 
296 


In  a  Northern  Bay. 

but  it  is  the  sleep  of  a  narcotic,  never  quite  releasing 
us  from  consciousness ;  and  it  is  there  always  before 
us,  like  the  narcotic,  with  the  fascination  of  death 
itself. 

Yet,  as  ecstasy  is  only  possible  to  one  who  is 
conscious  of  the  possibility  of  despair,  so  the  sea, 
as  it  detaches  us  from  the  world  and  our  safeguards 
and  our  happy  forgetfulnesses,  and  sets  us  by 
ourselves,  as  momentary  as  the  turn  of  a  wave,  and 
mattering  hardly  more  to  the  universe,  gives  us,  if 
we  will  take  them,  moments  of  almost  elemental 
joy.  The  salt  taste  of  the  sea-wind,  the  soft  en- 
veloping touch  of  the  water,  the  little  voice  whisper- 
ing among  the  rocks,  the  wings  of  a  sea-gull,  rigid 
in  the  fierce  abandonment  of  flight,  the  caress  of 
the  sand  upon  one's  feet  as  one  v/alks  slowly  at 
night  under  a  great  vault  of  darkness :  these, 
surely,  are  some  of  the  few  flawless  sensations  which 
merely  animal  pleasure  can  give  us.  Happiness, 
no  doubt,  would  be  to  put  off  our  souls,  as  one  puts 
ofF  an  uneasy  garment,  and  enjoy  these  things  as 
it  would  then  be  possible  to  enjoy  them.  Or  do 
we,  after  all,  feel  them  more  keenly,  since  more 
consciously,  for  the  moment,  because  they  are  not 
our  inner  life,  but  a  release  from  our  inner  life  ? 

September  22,  1900. 


297 


Winchelsea:   An  Aspect. 

We  saw  the  pure  lean  harsh 
Maid's  body  of  the  marsh, 
Without  one  curve's  caress 
In  the  straight  daintiness 
Of  its  young  frugal  fine 
Economy  of  line, 
In  faultless  beauty  lie 
Naked  under  the  sky. 
Naked  it  lay  and  still, 
Awaiting  what  new  thrill 
Of  the  ever-amorous  light 
In  that  austere  delight  ? 

That,  at  least,  was  the  question  I  asked  myself  as 
I  looked  down  from  the  highest  garden  in  Win- 
chelsea, that  famous  garden  which  has  taken  in 
part  of  the  old  town-gate,  and  seems  to  set  you  on 
a  pinnacle  and  show  you  all  the  glory  of  the  world. 
There  was  an  expectancy  throughout  all  the  empti- 
ness of  the  pale,  delicate,  and  severe  plain  which 
lay  there  between  the  rock  on  which  I  stood  and  the 
sea.  It  was  waiting  for  the  sun  to  envelop,  intoxi- 
cate, overwhelm  it. 

There  is  no  other  aspect  quite  like  that  aspect  in 
England,  and  it  was  with  difficulty  that  I  realised 
myself  to  be  in  England.  Across  the  marsh  was 
Rye,  piled  up  and  embattled  on  its  rock  like  Siena, 
with  sharp  red  edges.  The  seashore  might  have 
been  Rimini,  only  there  were  no  Apennines  going 
down  fiercely  into  the  sea.  The  meadows,  white 
flat  roads  winding  through  them,  the  glimpses  of 
water,  of  masts,  of  sails,  of  black  rigging ;  the  cows 
moving  so  formally  through  these  meadows,  in  the 
298 


Winchelsea. 

midst  of  these  tokens  of  the  sea ;  all  formed  them- 
selves into  a  picture,  and  I  felt  that  one  could  gaze 
down  on  it  always  with  the  same  surprise  at  its 
being  there.     It  was  so  improbable  and  so  beautiful. 

All  Winchelsea  is  like  a  picture,  and  has  other 
suggestions  of  Italy,  as  one  looks  down  a  brief 
street  between  old  houses,  as  one  does  in  the  Alban 
hill-towns,  and  sees  another  Campagna,  more 
wonderful  than  the  Roman,  because  the  sea  com- 
pletes it.     From  Frascati  one  only  sees  Rome. 

Winchelsea  is  built  in  squares  and  at  right 
angles.  It  is  formal  and  self-sufficient,  neither 
town  nor  village,  guarding  one  of  the  loveliest  of 
ruins,  but  without  the  general  quaint  ancientness 
of  Rye;  a  comfortable  place,  with  trees  and  fields 
everywhere,  with  hardly  any  streets,  hardly  an 
ugly  building,  hardly  a  shop.  One  climbs  to  it 
as  to  a  casket  set  on  a  hill;  it  seems  to  await  the 
visitor  like  a  conscious  peasant  in  costume ;  to  live 
in  it  would  be  like  living  in  a  museum.  How  much 
longer  will  it  remain  unspoiled,  when  all  the  world 
is  so  set  on  spoiling  it  ? 

Though  one  begins  by  thinking  of  Italy,  there 
are  signs  by  which  this  un-English  place  may  be 
recognised  as  English.  There  are  no  guides,  not 
even  children,  and  it  is  clean.  It  seems  astonishing, 
so  foreign  are  these  corners,  that  one  can  loiter  in 
them  without  reluctance.  Even  the  old  houses  that 
are  dropping  into  decay  crumble  gently.  Every- 
where there  is  a  discretion  in  things. 

There   are  souls   in  places,   and   places   draw  to 

299 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

them  people  made  after  their  image.  The  person 
in  whom  I  see  Winchelsea  may  seem  to  have  httle 
in  common  with  that  windy  height  over  the  marsh 
and  the  glory  of  the  world  that  is  shown  there. 
Yet  that  meekness  and  that  outrageous  beauty 
which  are  in  the  place  would  have  their  counterparts 
in  the  soul  of  the  woman.  She  would  live  in  a  low 
red  cottage  in  a  side  street,  with  no  view  out  of  any 
of  the  windows ;  and  she  would  be  shy  and  reticent, 
and  no  one  would  know  why  she  lived  there  all 
alone,  or  why  it  was  that  she  seemed  to  be  at  once 
so  sad  and  so  happy.  They  would  see  a  small, 
neat  woman  with  greyish  hair,  who  passed  in  the 
street  hurriedly,  her  lips  moving  as  if  she  were 
repeating  something  to  herself,  her  eyes  always 
wide  open,  the  humble  and  hungry  eyes  of  the 
fanatic.  The  backward  quiet,  the  silence,  collected- 
ness,  and  a  certain  thrill  in  the  simplicity  of  the  place 
would  have  passed  into  her,  or  seemed  to  find  in  her 
a  reflection.  She  too  will  have  had  her  ancient 
history,  the  romance  that  sometimes  comes  to  those 
who  are  no  longer  young,  and  that,  w^hen  it  goes, 
takes  everything  out  of  life  but  memory.  I  said 
that  Winchelsea  is  like  a  casket.  She  would  have 
chosen  it  as  a  casket  in  which  to  keep  her  memory 
unspoiled.  It  has  the  likeness  of  all  her  recollec- 
tions, as  she  sees  them  over  again,  never  any  greyer, 
but  with  the  heat  still  in  them,  carefully  hoarded. 
She  has  no  associations  with  the  place,  but  the  place 
makes  associations  for  her  grief;  it  shuts  her 
gently  in  with  her  grief,  in  an  unbroken  leisure, 
300 


Winchelsea. 

where  time  seems  to  pause  for  her,  in  one  of  his 
rare  intervals.  It  is  in  this  hushed,  aloof,  eager, 
and  remembering  figure  that  I  see  the  likeness  of 
Winchelsea. 

October  13,  1906. 


301 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

For  two  hours  and  a  half  the  fishing-boat  had  been 
running  before  the  wind,  as  a  greyhound  runs,  in 
long  leaps;  and  when  I  set  foot  on  shore  at  Bally- 
vaughan,  and  found  myself  in  the  little,  neat  hotel, 
and  waited  for  tea  in  the  room  with  the  worn  piano, 
the  album  of  manuscript  verses,  and  the  many 
photographs  of  the  young  girl  who  had  written 
them,  first  as  she  stands  holding  a  vioHn,  and  then, 
after  she  has  taken  vows,  in  the  white  habit  of  the 
Dominican  order,  I  seemed  to  have  stepped  out 
of  some  strange,  half-magical,  almost  real  dream, 
through  which  I  had  been  consciously  moving  on 
the  other  side  of  that  grey,  disturbed  sea,  upon 
those  grey  and  peaceful  islands  in  the  Atlantic. 
And  all  that  evening,  as  we  drove  for  hours  along 
the  Clare  coast  and  inland  into  Galway,  under  a 
sunset  of  gold  fire  and  white  spray  until  we  reached 
the  battlemented  towers  of  Tillyra  Castle,  I  had 
the  same  curious  sensation  of  having  been  dreaming; 
and  I  could  but  vaguely  remember  the  dream,  in 
which  I  was  still,  however,  absorbed.  We  passed, 
I  believe,  a  fine  slope  of  grey  mountains,  a  ruined 
abbey,  many  castle  ruins ;  we  talked  of  Parnell, 
of  the  county  families,  of  mysticism,  the  analogy  of 
that  old  Biblical  distinction  of  body,  soul,  and  spirit 
with  the  symbolical  realities  of  the  lamp,  the  wick, 
and  the  flame;  and  all  the  time  I  was  obsessed  by 
the  vague,  persistent  remembrance  of  those  vanishing 
islands,  which  wavered  somewhere  in  the  depths  of 
my  consciousness.  When  I  awoke  next  morning 
302 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

the  dream  had  resolved  itself  into  definite  shape, 
and  I  remembered  every  detail  of  those  last  three 
days,  during  which  I  had  been  so  far  from  civilisa- 
tion, so  much  further  out  of  the  world  than  I  had 
ever  been  before. 

It  was  on  the  morning  of  Wednesday,  August  5, 
1896,  that  a  party  of  four,  of  whom  I  alone  was  not 
an  Irishman,  got  into  Tom  Joyce's  hooker  at 
Cashla  Bay,  on  the  coast  of  Galway,  and  set  sail  for 
the  largest  of  the  three  islands  of  Aran,  Inishmore 
by  name,  that  is,  Large  Island.  The  hooker,  a 
half-decked,  cutter-rigged  fishing-boat  of  seventeen 
tons,  had  come  over  for  us  from  Aran,  and  we  set 
out  with  a  light  breeze,  which  presently  dropped 
and  left  us  almost  becalmed  under  a  very  hot  sun 
for  nearly  an  hour,  where  we  were  passed  by  a 
white  butterfly  that  was  making  straight  for  the 
open  sea.  We  were  nearly  four  hours  in  crossing, 
and  we  had  time  to  read  all  that  needed  reading  of 
Grania,  Miss  Emily  Lawless's  novel,  which  is 
supposed  to  be  the  classic  of  the  islands,  and  to  study 
our  maps  and  to  catch  one  mackerel.  But  I  found 
most  to  my  mind  this  passage  from  Roderic 
O 'Flaherty's  Choro graphical  Description  of  West  or 
H-Iar  Connaughty  which  in  its  quaint,  minute 
seventeenth-century  prose  told  me  more  about 
what  I  was  going  to  see  than  everything  else  that 
I  read  then  or  after  on  the  subject  of  these  islands. 
"The  soile,"  he  tells  us,  "is  almost  paved  over 
with  stones,  soe  as,  in  some  places,  nothing  is  to 
be  seen  but  large  stones  with  wide  openings  between 

303 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

them,  where  cattle  break  their  legs.  Scarce  any- 
other  stones  there  but  limestones,  and  marble  fit 
for  tombstones,  chymney  mantle  trees,  and  high 
crosses.  Among  these  stones  is  very  sweet  pasture, 
so  that  beefe,  veal,  mutton  are  better  and  earlyer 
in  season  here  than  elsewhere;  and  of  late  there 
is  plenty  of  cheese,  and  tillage  mucking,  and  corn 
is  the  same  with  the  seaside  tract.  In  some  places 
the  plow  goes.  On  the  shores  grows  samphire 
in  plenty,  ring-root  or  sea-holy,  and  sea-cabbage. 
Here  are  Cornish  choughs,  with  red  legs  and  bills. 
Here  are  ayries  of  hawkes,  and  birds  which  never 
fly  but  over  the  sea,  and,  therefore,  are  used  to  be 
eaten  on  fasting  days :  to  catch  which  people  goe 
down,  with  ropes  tyed  about  them,  into  the  caves 
of  cliffs  by  night,  and  with  a  candle  light  kill  abund- 
ance of  them.  Here  are  severall  wells  and  pooles, 
yet  in  extraordinary  dry  weather,  people  must  turn 
their  cattell  out  of  the  islands,  and  the  corn  failes. 
They  have  noe  fuell  but  cow-dung  dryed  with  the 
sun,  unless  they  bring  turf  in  from  the  western 
continent.  They  have  Cloghans,  a  kind  of  building 
of  stones  iayd  one  upon  another,  which  are  brought 
to  a  roof  without  any  manner  of  mortar  to  cement 
them,  some  of  which  cabins  will  hold  forty  men 
on  their  floor;  so  antient  that  nobody  knows  how 
long  ago  any  of  them  was  made.  Scarcity  of  wood 
and  store  of  fit  stones,  without  peradventure  found 
out  the  first  invention."  Reading  of  such  things 
as  these,  and  of  how  St.  Albeus,  Bishop  of  Imly^  had 
said,  "Great  is  that  island,  and  it  is  the  land  of  saints ; 
304 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

for  no  man  knows  how  many  saints  are  buried  there, 
but  God  alone";  and  of  an  old  saying:  "Athenry 
was,  Galway  is,  Aran  shall  be  the  best  of  the  three," 
we  grew,  after  a  while,  impatient  of  delay.  A 
good  breeze  sprang  up  at  last,  and  as  I  stood  in  the 
bow,  leaning  against  the  mast,  I  felt  the  one  quite 
perfectly  satisfying  sensation  of  movement :  to  race 
through  steady  water  before  a  stiff  sail,  on  which 
the  reefing  cords  are  tapping  in  rhythm  to  those 
nine  notes  of  the  sailors'  chorus  in  Tristan,  which 
always  ring  in  my  ears  when  I  am  on  the  sea,  for 
they  have  in  them  all  the  exultation  of  all  life  that 
moves  upon  the  waters. 

The  butterfly,  I  hope,  had  reached  land  before 
us ;  but  only  a  few  sea-birds  came  out  to  welcome 
us  as  we  drew  near  Inishmore,  the  Large  Island, 
which  is  nine  miles  long  and  a  mile  and  a  half  broad. 
I  gazed  at  the  long  line  of  the  island,  growing  more 
distinct  every  moment ;  first,  a  grey  outhne,  flat 
at  the  sea's  edge,  and  rising  up  beyond  in  irregular, 
rocky  hills,  terrace  above  terrace;  then,  against 
this  grey  outline,  white  houses  began  to  detach 
themselves,  the  sharp  line  of  the  pier  cutting  into 
the  curve  of  the  harbour;  and  then,  at  last,  the 
figures  of  men  and  women  moving  across  the  land. 
Nothing  is  more  mysterious,  more  disquieting,  than 
one's  first  ghmpse  of  an  island,  and  all  I  had  heard 
of  these  islands,  of  their  peace  in  the  heart  of  the 
storm,  was  not  a  little  mysterious  and  disquieting. 
I  knew  that  they  contained  the  oldest  ruins  and 
that  their  life  of  the  present  was  the  most  primitive 

305 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

life  of  any  part  of  Ireland ;  I  knew  that  they  were 
rarely  visited  by  the  tourist,  almost  never  by  any 
but  the  local  tourist ;  that  they  were  difficult  to 
reach,  sometimes  more  difficult  to  leave,  for  the 
uncertainty  of  weather  in  that  uncertain  region  of 
the  Atlantic  had  been  known  to  detain  some  of 
the  rare  travellers  there  for  days,  was  it  not  for 
weeks  ?  Here  one  was  absolutely  at  the  mercy  of 
the  elements,  which  might  at  any  moment  become 
unfriendly,  which,  indeed,  one  seemed  to  have  but 
apprehended  in  a  pause  of  their  eternal  enmity. 
And  we  seemed  also  to  be  venturing  among  an 
unknown  people,  who,  even  if  they  spoke  our  own 
language,  were  further  away  from  us,  more  foreign 
than  people  who  spoke  an  unknown  language  and 
lived  beyond  other  seas. 

As  we  walked  along  the  pier  towards  the  three 
whitewashed  cottages  which  form  the  Atlantic 
Hotel,  at  which  we  were  to  stay,  a  strange  being 
sprang  towards  us,  with  a  curiously  beast-like 
stealthiness  and  animation;  it  was  a  crazy  man, 
bare-footed  and  blear-eyed,  who  held  out  his  hand 
and  sang  out  at  us  in  a  high,  chanting  voice,  and  in 
what  sounded  rather  a  tone  of  command  than  of 
entreaty,  "Give  me  a  penny,  sir!  Give  me  a 
penny,  sir!"  We  dropped  something  into  his 
hat,  and  he  went  away  over  the  rocks,  laughing 
loudly  to  himself,  and  repeating  some  words  that 
he  had  heard  us  say.  We  passed  a  few  fishermen 
and  some  bare-footed  children,  who  looked  at  us 
curiously,  but  without  moving,  and  were  met  at 
306 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

the  door  of  the  middle  cottage  by  a  little,  fat  old 
woman  with  a  round  body  and  a  round  face,  wearing 
a  white  cap  tied  over  her  ears.  The  Atlantic  Hotel 
is  a  very  primitive  hotel ;  it  had  last  been  slept  in 
by  some  priests  from  the  mainland,  who  had  come 
on  their  holiday  with  bicycles ;  and  before  that 
by  a  German  philologist  who  was  learning  Irish. 
The  kitchen,  which  is  also  the  old  landlady's  bed- 
room, presents  a  medley  of  pots  and  pans  and  petti- 
coats as  you  pass  its  open  door  and  climb  the  little 
staircase,  diverging  oddly  on  either  side  after  the 
first  five  or  six  steps,  and  leading  on  the  right  to  a 
large  dining-room,  where  the  table  lounges  on  an 
inadequate  number  of  legs  and  the  chairs  bow  over 
when  you  lean  back  on  them.  I  have  slept  more 
luxuriously,  but  not  more  soundly,  than  in  the 
little  musty  bedroom  on  the  other  side  of  the 
stairs,  with  its  half-made  bed,  its  bare  and  unswept 
floor,  its  tiny  window,  of  which  only  the  lower  half 
could  be  opened,  and  this,  when  opened,  had  to 
be  supported  by  a  wooden  catch  from  outside. 
Going  to  sleep  in  that  little,  uncomfortable  room 
was  a  delight  in  itself;  for  the  starry  water  outside, 
which  one  could  see  through  that  narrow  slit  of 
window,  seemed  to  flow  softly  about  one  in  waves 
of  delicate  sleep. 

When  we  had  had  a  hasty  meal  and  had  got  a 
little  used  to  our  hotel,  and  had  realised  as  well  as 
we  could  where  we  were,  at  the  lower  end  of  the 
village  of  Kilronan,  which  stretches  up  the  hill  to 
the  north-west  on  either  side  of  the  main  road,  we 

307 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

set  out  in  the  opposite  direction,  finding  many- 
guides  by  the  way,  who  increased  in  number  as  we 
went  on  through  the  smaller  village  of  Kileaney 
up  to  the  south-eastern  hill,  on  which  are  a  holy 
well,  its  thorn-tree  hung  with  votive  ribbons,  and 
the  ruins  of  several  churches,  among  them  the  church 
of  St.  Enda,  the  patron  saint  of  the  island.  At 
first  we  were  able  to  walk  along  a  very  tolerable 
road,  then  we  branched  ofi^  upon  a  little  strip  of  grey 
sand,  piled  in  mounds  as  high  as  if  it  had  been 
drifted  snow,  and  from  that,  turning  a  little  inland, 
we  came  upon  the  road  again,  which  began  to  get 
stonier  as  we  neared  the  village.  Our  principal 
guide,  an  elderly  man  with  long  thick  curls  of 
flaxen  hair  and  a  seaman's  beard,  shaved  away  from 
the  chin,  talked  fairly  good  English,  with  a  strong 
accent,  and  he  told  us  of  the  poverty  of  the  people, 
the  heavy  rents  they  have  to  pay  for  soil  on  which 
no  grass  grows,  and  the  difficult  living  they  make 
out  of  their  fishing,  and  their  little  tillage,  and  the 
cattle  which  they  take  over  in  boats  to  the  fairs  at 
Galway,  throwing  them  into  the  sea  when  they  get 
near  land,  and  leaving  them  to  swim  ashore.  He 
was  dressed,  as  are  almost  all  the  peasants  of  Aran, 
in  clothes  woven  and  made  on  the  island  —  loose, 
rough,  woollen  things,  of  drab,  or  dark  blue,  or  grey, 
sometimes  charming  in  colour;  he  had  a  flannel 
shirt,  a  kind  of  waistcoat  with  sleeves,  very  loose 
and  shapeless  trousers  worn  without  braces,  an 
old  and  discoloured  slouch  hat  on  his  head,  and  on 
his  feet  the  usual  pampooties,  slippers  of  undressed 
308 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

hide,  drawn  together  and  stitched  into  shape,  with 
pointed  toes,  and  a  cord  across  the  instep.  The 
village  to  which  we  had  come  was  a  cluster  of  white- 
washed cabins,  a  little  better  built  than  those  I 
had  seen  in  Galway,  with  the  brown  thatch  fastened 
down  with  ropes  drawn  cross-wise  over  the  roof 
and  tied  to  wooden  pegs  driven  into  the  wall  for 
protection  against  the  storm  blowing  in  from  the 
Atlantic.  They  had  the  usual  two  doors,  facing 
each  other  at  front  and  back,  the  windier  of  the 
two  being  kept  closed  in  rough  weather,  and  the 
doors  were  divided  in  half  by  the  usual  hatch. 
As  we  passed,  a  dark  head  would  appear  at  the  upper 
half  of  the  door,  and  a  dull  glow  of  red  would  rise 
out  of  the  shadow.  The  women  of  Aran  almost 
all  dress  in  red,  the  petticoat  very  heavily  woven, 
the  crossed  shawl  or  bodice  of  a  thinner  texture 
of  wool.  Those  whom  we  met  on  the  roads  wore 
thicker  shawls  over  their  heads,  and  they  would 
sometimes  draw  the  shawls  closer  about  them,  as 
women  in  the  East  draw  their  veils  closer  about 
their  faces.  As  they  came  out  to  their  doors  to 
see  us  pass,  I  noticed  in  their  manner  a  certain 
mingling  of  curiosity  and  shyness,  an  interest  which 
was  never  quite  eager.  Some  of  the  men  came  out 
and  quietly  followed  us  as  we  were  led  along  a 
twisting  way  between  the  cabins ;  and  the  children, 
boys  and  girls,  in  a  varying  band  of  from  twenty  to 
thirty,  ran  about  our  heels,  stopping  whenever  we 
stopped,  and  staring  at  us  with  calm  wonder. 
They   were    very    inquisitive,    but,    unlike    English 

309 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

villagers  in  remote  places,  perfectly  polite,  and 
neither  resented  our  coming  among  them  nor  jeered 
at  us  for  being  foreign  to  their  fashions. 

The  people  of  Aran  (they  are  about  3000  in 
all),  as  I  then  saw  them  for  the  first  time,  and  as  I 
saw  them  during  the  few  days  of  my  visit,  seemed 
to  me  a  simple,  dignified,  self-sufficient,  sturdily 
primitive  people,  to  whom  Browning's  phrase  of 
"gentle  islanders"  might  well  be  applied.  They 
could  be  fierce  on  occasion,  as  I  knew;  for  I 
remembered  the  story  of  their  refusal  to  pay  the 
county  cess,  and  how,  when  the  cess-collector  had 
come  over  to  take  his  dues  by  force,  they  had 
assembled  on  the  seashore  with  sticks  and  stones, 
and  would  not  allow  him  even  to  land.  But  they 
had,  for  the  most  part,  mild  faces,  of  the  long  Irish 
type,  often  regular  in  feature,  but  with  loose  and 
drooping  mouths  and  discoloured  teeth.  Most 
had  blue  eyes,  the  men,  oftener  than  the  women, 
having  fair  hair.  They  held  themselves  erect, 
and  walked  nimbly,  with  a  peculiar  step  due  to 
the  rocky  ways  they  have  generally  to  walk  on ; 
few  of  them,  I  noticed,  had  large  hands  or  feet, 
and  all,  without  exception,  were  thin,  as  indeed 
the  Irish  peasant  almost  invariably  is.  The  women 
too,  for  the  most  part,  were  thin,  and  had  the  same 
long  faces,  often  regular,  with  straight  eyebrows 
and  steady  eyes,  not  readily  changing  expression ; 
they  hold  themselves  well,  a  little  like  men,  whom, 
indeed,  they  somewhat  resemble  in  figure.  As  I  saw 
them,  leaning  motionless  against  their  doors,  walking 
310 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

with  their  deHberateness  of  step  along  the  roads, 
with  eyes  in  which  there  was  no  wonder,  none  of 
the  fever  of  the  senses,  placid  animals  on  whom 
emotion  has  never  worked  in  any  vivid  or  passionate 
way,  I  seemed  to  see  all  the  pathetic  contentment 
of  those  narrow  lives,  in  which  day  follows  day 
with  the  monotony  of  wave  lapping  on  wave.  I 
observed  one  young  girl  of  twelve  or  thirteen  who 
had  something  of  the  ardency  of  beauty,  and  a  few 
shy,  impressive  faces,  their  hair  drawn  back  smoothly 
from  the  middle  parting,  appearing  suddenly  behind 
doors  or  over  walls ;  almost  all,  even  the  very  old 
women,  had  nobility  of  gesture  and  attitude,  but 
in  the  more  personal  expression  of  faces  there  was 
for  the  most  part  but  a  certain  quietude,  seeming 
to  reflect  the  grey  hush,  the  bleak  greyness  of  this 
land  of  endless  stone  and  endless  sea. 

When  we  had  got  through  the  village  and 
begun  to  climb  the  hill,  we  were  still  followed,  and 
we  were  followed  for  all  the  rest  of  the  way  by 
about  fifteen  youngsters,  all,  except  one,  bare- 
footed, and  two,  though  boys,  wearing  petticoats, 
as  the  Irish  peasant  children  not  unfrequently  do, 
for  economy,  when  they  are  young  enough  not  to 
resent  it.  Our  guide,  the  elderly  man  with  the 
flaxen  curls,  led  us  first  to  the  fort  set  up  by  the 
soldiers  of  Cromwell,  who,  coming  over  to  keep 
down  the  Catholic  rebels,  ended  by  turning  Catholic 
and  marrying  and  settling  among  the  native  people ; 
then  to  Teglach  Enda,  a  ruined  church  of  very  early 
masonry,   made  of  large   blocks   set   together  with 

311 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

but  little  cement  —  the  church  of  St.  Enda,  who 
came  to  Aran  in  about  the  year  480,  and  fifty-eight 
years  later  laid  his  bones  in  the  cemetery  which  was 
to  hold  the  graves  of  not  less  than  a  hundred  and 
twenty  saints.  On  our  way  inland  to  TeampuU 
Benen,  the  remains  of  an  early  oratory,  surrounded 
by  cloghans  or  stone  dwellings  made  of  heaped 
stones  which,  centuries  ago,  had  been  the  cells  of 
monks,  we  came  upon  the  large  puffing-hole,  a 
great  gap  in  the  earth,  going  down  by  steps  of 
rock  to  the  sea,  which  in  stormy  weather  dashes  foam 
to  the  height  of  its  sixty  feet,  reminding  me  of  the 
sounding  hollows  on  the  coast  of  Cornwall.  The 
road  here,  as  on  almost  the  whole  of  the  island,  was 
through  stone-walled  fields  of  stone.  Grass,  or 
any  soil,  was  but  a  rare  interval  between  a  broken 
and  distracted  outstretch  of  grey  rock,  lying  in  large 
flat  slabs,  in  boulders  of  every  size  and  shape,  and 
in  innumerable  stones,  wedged  in  the  ground  or 
lying  loose  upon  it,  round,  pointed,  rough,  and 
polished;  an  unending  greyness,  cut  into  squares 
by  the  walls  of  carefully-heaped  stones,  which  we 
climbed  with  great  insecurity,  for  the  stones  were 
kept  in  place  by  no  more  than  the  more  or  less 
skilful  accident  of  their  adjustment,  and  would  turn 
under  our  feet  or  over  in  our  hands  as  we  climbed 
them.  Occasionally  a  little  space  of  pasture  had 
been  cleared  or  a  little  artificial  soil  laid  down,  and 
a  cow  browsed  on  the  short  grass.  Ferns,  and 
occasionally  maidenhair,  grew  in  the  fissures  splin- 
tered between  the  rocks ;  and  I  saw  mallow,  stone- 
312 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

crop,  the  pale  blue  wind-flower,  the  white  campian, 
many  nettles,  ivy,  and  a  few  bushes.  In  this  part 
of  the  island  there  were  no  trees,  which  were  to  be 
found  chiefly  on  the  north-western  side,  in  a  few 
small  clusters  about  some  of  the  better  houses,  and 
almost  wholly  of  alder  and  willow.  As  we  came 
to  the  sheer  edge  of  the  sea  and  saw  the  Atlantic, 
and  knew  that  there  was  nothing  but  the  Atlantic 
between  this  last  shivering  remnant  of  Europe  and 
the  far-olF  continent  of  America,  it  was  with  no 
feeling  of  surprise  that  we  heard  from  the  old  man 
who  led  us  that  no  later  than  two  years  ago  an  old 
woman  of  those  parts  had  seen,  somewhere  on  this 
side  of  the  horizon,  the  blessed  island  of  Tir-nan- 
Ogue,  the  island  of  immortal  youth,  which  is  held 
by  the  Irish  peasants  to  lie  somewhere  in  that 
mysterious  region  of  the  sea. 

We  loitered  on  the  cliff^s  for  some  time,  leaning 
over  them,  and  looking  into  the  magic  mirror  that 
glittered  there  like  a  crystal,  and  with  all  the  soft 
depth  of  a  crystal  in  it,  hesitating  on  the  veiled 
threshold  of  visions.  Since  I  have  seen  Aran  and 
Sligo,  I  have  never  wondered  that  the  Irish  peasant 
still  sees  fairies  about  his  path,  and  that  the  bound- 
aries of  what  we  call  the  real,  and  of  what  is  for  us 
the  unseen,  are  vague  to  him.  The  sea  on  those 
coasts  is  not  like  the  sea  as  I  know  it  on  any  other 
coast ;  it  has  in  it  more  of  the  twilight.  And  the 
sky  seems  to  come  down  more  softly,  with  more 
stealthy  step,  more  illusive  wings,  and  the  land  to 
come  forward  with  a  more  hesitating  and  gradual 

313 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

approach ;  and  land  and  sea  and  sky  to  mingle 
more  absolutely  than  on  any  other  coast.  I  have 
never  realised  less  the  slipping  of  sand  through  the 
hour-glass ;  I  have  never  seemed  to  see  with  so 
remote  an  impartiality,  as  in  the  presence  of  brief 
and  yet  eternal  things,  the  troubling  and  insignificant 
accidents  of  life.  I  have  never  believed  less  in  the 
reality  of  the  visible  world,  in  the  importance  of 
all  we  are  most  serious  about.  One  seems  to  wash 
off  the  dust  of  cities,  the  dust  of  beliefs,  the  dust  of 
incredulities. 

It  was  nearly  seven  o'clock  when  we  got  back  to 
Kilronan,  and  after  dinner  we  sat  for  a  while  talking 
and  looking  out  through  the  little  windows  at  the 
night.  But  I  could  not  stay  indoors  in  this  new, 
marvellous  place;  and,  persuading  one  of  my 
friends  to  come  with  me,  I  walked  up  through 
Kilronan,  which  I  found  to  be  a  far  more  solid  and 
populous  village  than  the  one  we  had  seen ;  and 
coming  out  on  the  high  ground  beyond  the  houses, 
we  saw  the  end  of  a  pale  green  sunset.  Getting 
back  to  our  hotel,  we  found  the  others  still  talking; 
but  I  could  not  stay  indoors,  and  after  a  while  went 
out  by  myself  to  the  end  of  the  pier  in  the  darkness, 
and  lay  there  looking  into  the  water  and  into  the 
fishing-boats  lying  close  up  against  the  land,  where 
there  were  red  lights  moving,  and  the  shadows  of 
men,  and  the  sound  of  deep-throated  Irish. 

I  remember  no  dreams  that  night,  but  I  was  told 
that  I  had  talked  in  my  sleep,  and  I  was  willing  to 
believe  it.  In  the  morning,  not  too  early,  we  set 
314 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

out  on  an  outside  car  (that  rocking  and  most  com- 
fortable vehicle,  which  I  prefer  to  everything  but 
a  gondola)  for  the  Seven  Churches  and  Dun  Aengus, 
along  the  only  beaten  road  in  the  island.  The 
weather,  as  we  started,  was  grey  and  misty,  threaten- 
ing rain,  and  we  could  but  just  see  the  base-line 
of  the  Clare  mountains  across  the  grey  and  dis- 
coloured waters  of  the  bay.  At  the  Seven  Churches 
we  were  joined  by  a  peasant,  who  diligently  showed 
us  the  ruined  walls  of  TeampuU  Brecan,  with  its 
slab  inscribed  in  Gaehc  with  the  words,  "Pray 
for  the  two  canons";  the  stone  of  the  "VII. 
Romani";  St.  Brecan's  headstone,  carved  with 
Gaehc  letters;  the  carved  cross  and  the  headstone 
of  St.  Brecan's  bed.  More  peasants  joined  us,  and 
some  children,  who  fixed  on  us  their  usual  placid 
and  tolerant  gaze,  in  which  curiosity  contended 
with  an  indolent  air  of  contentment.  In  all  these 
people  I  noticed  the  same  discreet  manners  that  had 
already  pleased  me;  and  once,  as  we  were  sitting 
on  a  tombstone  in  the  interior  of  one  of  the  churches, 
eating  the  sandwiches  that  we  had  brought  for 
luncheon,  a  man,  who  had  entered  the  doorway, 
drew  back  instantly,  seeing  us  taking  a  meal. 

The  Seven  Churches  are  rooted  in  long  grass, 
spreading  in  billowy  mounds,  intertwisted  here  and 
there  with  brambles;  but  when  we  set  out  for  the 
circular  fort  of  Dun  Onaght,  which  lies  on  the 
other  side  of  the  road,  at  no  great  distance  up  the 
hill,  we  were  once  more  in  the  land  of  rocks;  and 
it  was  through  a  boreen,  or  lane,  entirely  paved  with 

315 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

loose  and  rattling  stones,  that  we  made  our  way 
up  the  ascent.  At  the  top  of  the  hill  we  found 
ourselves  outside  such  a  building  as  I  had  never 
seen  before  :  an  ancient  fort,  90  feet  in  diameter, 
and  on  the  exterior  16  feet  high,  made  of  stones 
placed  one  upon  another,  without  mortar,  in  the 
form  of  two  walls,  set  together  in  layers,  the  inner 
wall  lower  than  the  outer,  so  as  to  form  a  species 
of  gallery,  to  which  stone  steps  led  at  intervals.  No 
sooner  had  we  got  inside  than  the  rain  began  to 
fall  in  torrents,  and  it  was  through  a  bhnding  down- 
pour that  we  hurried  back  to  the  car,  scarcely  stop- 
ping to  notice  a  Druid  altar  that  stood  not  far  out 
of  our  way.  As  we  drove  along,  the  rain  ceased 
suddenly;  the  wet  cloud  that  had  been  steaming 
over  the  faint  and  still  sea,  as  if  desolated  with 
winter,  vanished  in  sunshine,  caught  up  into  a 
glory;  and  the  water,  transfigured  by  so  instant 
a  magic,  was  at  once  changed  from  a  grey  wilderness 
of  shivering  mist  into  a  warm  and  flashing  and 
intense  blueness,  which  gathered  ardency  of  colour, 
until  the  whole  bay  burned  with  blue  fire.  The 
clouds  had  been  swept  behind  us,  and  on  the  other 
side  of  the  water,  for  the  whole  length  of  the  horizon, 
the  beautiful,  softly  curving  Connemara  mountains 
stood  out  against  the  sky  as  if  lit  by  some  interior 
illumination,  blue  and  pearl-grey  and  grey-rose. 
Along  the  shore-line  a  trail  of  faint  cloud  drifted 
from  kelp-fire  to  kelp-fire,  like  altar-smoke  drifting 
into  altar-smoke ;  and  that  mysterious  mist  floated 
into  the  lower  hollows  of  the  hills,  softening  their 
316 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

outlines   and   colours   with   a   vague   and   fluttiering 
and  luminous  veil  of  brightness. 

It  was  about  four  in  the  afternoon  when  we  came 
to  the  village  of  Kilmurvey,  upon  the  seashore, 
and,  leaving  our  car,  began  to  climb  the  hill  leading 
to  Dun  Aengus.  Passing  two  outer  ramparts, 
now  much  broken,  one  of  them  seeming  to  end 
suddenly  in  the  midst  of  a  chevaux  de  /rise  of  pillar- 
like stones  thrust  endways  into  the  earth,  we  entered 
the  central  fort  by  a  lintelled  doorway,  set  in  the 
side  of  a  stone  wall  of  the  same  Cyclopean  architec- 
ture as  Dun  Onaght,  i8  feet  high  on  the  outside, 
and  with  two  adhering  inner  walls,  each  lower  in 
height,  12  feet  9  inches  in  thickness.  This  fort 
is  150  feet  north  and  south  and  140  feet  east  and 
west,  and  on  the  east  side  the  circular  wall  ends 
suddenly  on  the  very  edge  of  a  cliff  going  down 
300  feet  to  the  sea.  It  is  supposed  that  the  circle 
was  once  complete,  and  that  the  wall  and  the  solid 
ground  itself,  which  is  here  of  bare  rock,  were  slowly 
eaten  away  by  the  gnawing  of  centuries  of  waves, 
which  have  been  at  their  task  since  some  hundreds 
of  years  before  the  birth  of  Christ,  when  we  know 
not  what  king,  ruling  over  the  races  called  "the 
servile,"  entrenched  himself  on  that  impregnable 
height.  The  Atlantic  lies  endlessly  out  towards 
the  sunrise,  beating,  on  the  south,  upon  the  brown 
and  towering  rock  of  the  cliffs  of  Moher,  rising  up 
nearly  a  sheer  thousand  feet.  The  whole  grey 
and  desolate  island,  flowering  into  barren  stone, 
stretches  out  on  the  other  side,  where  the  circle  of 

317 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

the  water  washes  from  Galway  Bay  into  the  Atlantic. 
Looking  out  over  all  that  emptiness  of  sea,  one 
imagines  the  long-oared  galleys  of  the  ravaging 
kings  who  had  lived  there,  some  hundreds  of  years 
before  the  birth  of  Christ ;  and  the  emptiness  of 
the  fortress  filled  with  long-haired  warriors,  coming 
back  from  the  galleys  with  captured  slaves,  and 
cattle,  and  the  spoil  of  citadels.  We  know  from  the 
Bardic  writers  that  a  civilisation,  similar  to  that  of 
the  Homeric  poems,  lived  on  in  Ireland  almost 
to  the  time  of  the  coming  of  St.  Patrick ;  and  it 
was  something  also  of  the  sensation  of  Homer  — 
the  walls  of  Troy,  the  heroes,  and  that  "face  that 
launched  a  thousand  ships"  — which  came  to  me 
as  we  stood  upon  these  unconquerable  walls,  to 
which  a  generation  of  men  had  been  as  a  moth's 
flight  and  a  hundred  years  as  a  generation  of  men. 
Coming  back  from  Dun  Aengus,  one  of  our 
party  insisted  on  walking;  and  we  had  not  been 
long  indoors  when  he  came  in  with  a  singular  person 
whom  he  had  picked  up  on  the  way,  a  professional 
story-teller,  who  had  for  three  weeks  been  teaching 
Irish  to  the  German  philologist  who  had  preceded 
us  on  the  island.  He  was  half  blind  and  of  wild 
appearance ;  a  small  and  hairy  man,  all  gesture,  and 
as  if  set  on  springs,  who  spoke  somewhat  broken 
English  in  a  roar.  He  lamented  that  we  could 
understand  no  Irish,  but,  even  in  English,  he  had 
many  things  to  tell,  most  of  which  he  gave  as  but 
"talk,"  making  it  very  clear  that  we  were  not  to 
suppose  him  to  vouch  for  them.  His  own  family, 
318 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

he  told  us,  was  said  to  be  descended  from  the  roons, 
or  seals,  but  that  certainly  was  "talk";  and  a 
witch  had,  only  nine  months  back,  been  driven  out 
of  the  island  by  the  priest;  and  there  were  many 
who  said  they  had  seen  fairies,  but  for  his  part  he 
had  never  seen  them.  But  with  this  he  began  to 
swear  on  the  name  of  God  and  the  saints,  rising 
from  his  chair  and  hfting  up  his  hands,  that  what 
he  was  going  to  tell  us  was  the  truth ;  and  then  he 
told  how  a  man  had  once  come  into  his  house  and 
admired  his  young  child,  who  was  lying  there  in  his 
bed,  and  had  not  said  "God  bless  you!"  (without 
which  to  admire  is  to  envy  and  to  bring  under  the 
power  of  the  fairies),  and  that  night,  and  for  many 
following  nights,  he  had  wakened  and  heard  a  sound 
of  fighting,  and  one  night  had  lit  a  candle,  but 
to  no  avail,  and  another  night  had  gathered  up  the 
blanket  and  tried  to  fling  it  over  the  head  of  whoever 
might  be  there,  but  had  caught  no  one;  only  in 
the  morning,  going  to  a  box  in  which  fish  were 
kept,  he  had  found  blood  in  the  box;  and  at  this 
he  rose  again,  and  again  swore  on  the  name  of 
God  and  the  saints  that  he  was  telling  us  only  the 
truth,  and  true  it  was  that  the  child  had  died; 
and  as  for  the  man  who  had  ill-wished  him,  "I 
could  point  him  out  any  day,"  he  said  fiercely. 
And  then,  with  many  other  stories  of  the  doings  of 
fairies  and  priests  (for  he  was  very  religious),  and 
of  the  "Dane"  who  had  come  to  the  island  to 
learn  Irish  ("and  he  knew  all  the  languages,  the 
Proosy,    and    the    Roosy,    and   the   Span,    and   the 

319 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

Grig"),  he  told  us  how  Satan,  being  led  by  pride 
to  equal  himself  with  God,  looked  into  the  glass 
in  which  God  only  should  look,  and  when  Satan 
looked  into  the  glass,  "Hell  was  made  in  a  minute." 
Next  morning  we  were  to  leave  early,  and  at 
nine  o'clock  we  were  rowed  out  to  the  hooker,  which 
lifted  sail  in  a  good  breeze,  and  upon  a  somewhat 
pitching  sea,  for  the  second  island,  Inishmaan,  that 
is,  the  Middle  Island,  which  is  three  miles  long  and 
a  mile  and  a  half  broad.  We  came  within  easy 
distance  of  the  shore,  after  about  half  an  hour's 
quick  sailing,  and  a  curragh  came  out  to  us,  rowed 
by  two  islanders ;  but,  finding  the  sea  very  rough  in 
Gregory  Sound,  we  took  them  on  board,  and, 
towing  the  boat  after  us,  went  about  to  the  Foul 
Sound  on  the  southern  side  of  the  island,  where 
the  sea  was  much  calmer.  Here  we  got  into  the 
curragh,  sitting  motionless  for  fear  a  slight  move- 
ment on  the  part  of  any  of  us  should  upset  it.  The 
curragh  is  simply  the  coracle  of  the  ancient  Britons, 
made  of  wooden  laths  covered  with  canvas,  and  tarred 
on  the  outside,  bent  into  the  shape  of  a  round- 
bottomed  boat  with  a  raised  and  pointed  prow,  and 
so  light  that,  when  on  shore,  two  men  can  carry  it 
reversed  on  their  heads,  like  an  immense  hat  or 
umbrella.  As  the  curragh  touched  the  shore, 
some  of  the  islanders  who  had  assembled  at  the 
edge  of  the  sea  came  into  the  water  to  meet  us, 
and  took  hold  of  the  boat,  and  lifted  the  prow  of  it 
upon  land,  and  said,  "You  are  welcome,  you  are 
welcome!"  One  of  them  came  with  us,  a  nimble 
320 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

peasant  of  about  forty,  who  led  the  way  up  the 
terraced  side  of  the  hill,  on  which  there  was  a  little 
grass,  near  the  seashore,  and  then  scarce  anything 
but  slabs  and  boulders  of  stone,  to  a  little  ruined 
oratory,  almost  filled  with  an  alder  tree,  the  only 
tree  I  saw  on  the  island.  All  around  it  were  grave- 
stones, half-defaced  by  the  weather,  but  carved  with 
curious  armorial  bearings,  as  it  seemed,  representing 
the  sun  and  moon  and  stars  about  a  cross  formed 
of  the  Christian  monogram.  Among  the  graves 
were  lying  huge  beams,  that  had  been  flung  up  the 
hillside  from  some  wrecked  vessel  in  one  of  the 
storms  that  beat  upon  the  island.  Going  on  a 
little  farther  we  came  to  the  ancient  stone  fort  of 
Dun  Moher,  an  inclosure  slightly  larger  than  Dun 
Onaght,  but  smaller  than  Dun  Aengus ;  and  coming 
down  on  the  other  side,  by  some  stone  steps,  we 
made  our  way,  along  a  very  rocky  boreen,  towards 
the  village  that  twisted  upon  a  brown  zigzag 
around  the  slope  of  the  hill. 

In  the  village  we  were  joined  by  some  more  men 
and  children ;  and  a  number  of  women,  wearing 
the  same  red  clothes  that  we  had  seen  on  the  larger 
island,  and  looking  at  us  with  perhaps  scarcely 
so  shy  a  curiosity  (for  they  were  almost  too  unused 
to  strangers  to  have  adopted  a  manner  of  shyness), 
came  out  to  their  doors  and  looked  up  at  us  out  of 
the  darkness  of  many  interiors,  from  where  they 
sat  on  the  ground  knitting  or  carding  wool.  We 
passed  the  chapel,  a  very  modern-looking  building, 
made  out  of  an  ancient   church,  and   turned  in  for 

321 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

a  moment  to  the  cottage  where  the  priest  sleeps 
when  he  comes  over  from  Inishmore  on  Saturday- 
night  to  say  early  mass  on  Sunday  morning  before 
going  on  to  Inisheer  for  the  second  mass.  We  saw 
his  little  white  room,  very  quaint  and  neat ;  and 
the  woman  of  the  house,  speaking  only  Irish, 
motioned  us  to  sit  down,  and  could  hardly  be  pre- 
vented from  laying  out  plates  and  glasses  for  us 
upon  the  table.  As  we  got  a  little  through  the 
more  populous  part  of  the  village,  we  saw  ahead  of 
us,  down  a  broad  lane,  a  very  handsome  girl,  holding 
the  end  of  a  long  ribbon,  decorated  with  a  green 
bough,  across  the  road.  Other  girls  and  some  older 
women  were  standing  by,  and,  when  we  came  up, 
the  handsome  girl,  with  the  low  forehead  and  the 
sombre  blue  eyes,  cried  out  laughingly,  in  her 
scanty  English,  "Cash,  cash!"  We  paid  toll, 
as  the  custom  is,  and  got  her  blessing ;  and  went 
on  our  way,  leaving  the  path,  and  climbing  many 
stone  walls,  until  we  came  to  the  great  fort  of  Dun 
Conor  on  the  hill,  the  largest  of  the  ancient  forts  of 
Aran. 

Dun  Conor  is  227  feet  north  and  south  and  115 
feet  east  and  west,  with  walls  in  three  sections,  20 
feet  high  on  the  outside  and  18  feet  7  inches  thick. 
We  climbed  to  the  top  and  walked  around  the  wall, 
where  the  wind  blowing  in  from  the  sea  beat  so 
hard  upon  us  that  we  could  scarcely  keep  our 
footing.  From  this  height  we  could  see  all  over 
the  island  lying  out  beneath  us,  grey,  and  broken 
into  squares  by  the  walled  fields ;  the  brown  thatch 
322 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

of  the  village,  the  smoke  coming  up  from  the 
chimneys,  here  and  there  a  red  shawl  or  skirt,  the 
grey  sand  by  the  sea  and  the  grey  sea  all  round. 
As  we  stood  on  the  wall  many  peasants  came  slowly 
about  us,  climbing  up  on  all  sides,  and  some  stood 
together  just  inside  the  entrance,  and  two  or  three 
girls  sat  down  on  the  other  side  of  the  arena,  knitting. 
Presently  an  old  man,  scarcely  leaning  on  the  stick 
which  he  carried  in  his  hand,  came  towards  us,  and 
began  slowly  to  climb  the  steps.  "It  is  my  father," 
said  one  of  the  men;  "he  is  the  oldest  man  on  the 
island;  he  was  born  in  1812."  The  old  man 
climbed  slowly  up  to  where  we  stood ;  a  mild  old 
man,  with  a  pale  face,  carefully  shaved,  and  a  firm 
mouth,  who  spoke  the  best  English  that  we  had 
heard  there.  "If  any  gentleman  has  committed  a 
crime,"  said  the  oldest  man  on  the  island,  "we'll 
hide  him.  There  was  a  man  killed  his  father,  and 
he  came  over  here,  and  we  hid  him  for  two  months, 
and  he  got  away  safe  to  America." 

As  we  came  down  from  the  fort  the  old  man 
came  with  us,  and  I  and  another,  walking  ahead, 
lingered  for  some  time  with  the  old  man  by  a  stone 
stile.  "Have  you  ever  seen  the  fairies.^"  said  my 
friend,  and  a  quaint  smile  flickered  over  the  old 
man's  face,  and  with  many  ohs  !  and  grave  gestures 
he  told  us  that  he  had  never  seen  them,  but  that  he 
had  heard  them  crying  in  the  fort  by  night ;  and  one 
night,  as  he  was  going  along  with  his  dog,  just  at 
the  spot  where  we  were  then  standing,  the  dog 
had   suddenly   rushed   at   something   or   some   one, 

323 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  had  rushed  round  and  round  him,  but  he  could 
see  nothing,  though  it  was  bright  moonhght,  and 
so  Hght  that  he  could  have  seen  a  rat ;  and  he  had 
followed  across  several  fields,  and  again  the  dog 
had  rushed  at  the  thing,  and  had  seemed  to  be 
beaten  off,  and  had  come  back  covered  with  sweat, 
and  panting,  but  he  could  see  nothing.  And  there 
was  a  man  once,  he  knew  the  man,  and  could  point 
him  out,  who  had  been  out  in  his  boat  (and  he 
motioned  with  his  stick  to  a  certain  spot  on  the 
water),  and  a  sea  fairy  had  seized  hold  of  his  boat 
and  tried  to  come  into  it ;  but  he  had  gone  quickly 
on  shore,  and  the  thing,  which  looked  hke  a  man, 
had  turned  back  into  the  sea.  And  there  had 
been  a  man  once  on  the  island  who  used  to  talk 
with  the  fairies;  and  you  could  hear  him  going 
along  the  roads  by  night  swearing  and  talking  with 
the  fairies.  "And  have  you  ever  heard,"  said 
my  friend  "of  the  seals,  the  roons,  turning  into 
men?"  "And  indeed,"  said  the  oldest  man  on 
the  island,  smiling,  "I'm  a  roon,  for  I'm  one  of 
the  family  they  say  comes  from  the  roons."  "And 
have  you  ever  heard,"  said  my  friend,  "of  men 
going  back  into  the  sea  and  turning  roons  again  ^ " 
"I  never  heard  that,"  said  the  oldest  man  on  the 
island  reflectively,  seeming  to  ponder  over  the 
probability  of  the  occurrence;  "no,"  he  repeated 
after  a  pause,  "I  never  heard  that." 

We  came  back  to  the  village  by  the  road  we  had 
come,  and  passed  again  the  handsome  girl  who  had 
taken  toll ;  she  was  sitting  by  the  roadside  knitting, 

324 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

and  looked  at  us  sidelong  as  we  passed,  with  an 
almost  imperceptible  smile  in  her  eyes.  We  wan- 
dered for  some  time  a  little  vaguely,  the  amiabihty 
of  the  islanders  leading  them  to  bring  us  in  search 
of  various  ruins  which  we  imagined  to  exist,  and 
which  they  did  not  like  to  tell  us  were  not  in  exist- 
ence. I  found  the  people  on  this  island  even  more 
charming,  because  a  httle  simpler,  more  untouched 
by  civilisation,  than  those  on  the  larger  island. 
They  were  of  necessity  a  little  lonelier,  for  if  few 
people  come  to  Inishmore,  how  many  have  ever 
spent  a  night  on  Inishmaan  ^  Inishmore  has  its 
hotel,  but  there  is  no  hotel  on  Inishmaan;  there 
is  indeed  one  public-house,  but  there  is  not  even 
a  policeman,  so  sober,  so  law-abiding  are  these 
islanders.  It  is  true  that  I  succeeded,  with  some 
difficulty,  and  under  cover  of  some  mystery,  in  secur- 
ing, what  I  had  long  wished  to  taste,  a  bottle  of 
poteen  or  ilhcit  whisky.  But  the  brewing  of 
poteen  is,  after  all,  almost  romantic  in  its  way, 
with  that  queer,  sophistical  romance  of  the  contra- 
band. That  was  not  the  romance  I  associated  with 
this  most  peaceful  of  islands  as  we  walked  along 
the  sand  on  the  seashore,  passing  the  kelp-burners, 
who  were  collecting  long  brown  trails  of  seaweed. 
More  than  anything  I  had  ever  seen,  this  seashore 
gave  me  the  sensation  of  the  mystery  and  the  calm 
of  all  the  islands  one  has  ever  dreamed  of,  all  the 
fortunate  islands  that  have  ever  been  saved  out  of 
the  disturbing  sea;  this  delicate  pearl-grey  sand, 
the  deeper  grey  of  the  stones,  the  more  luminous 

32s 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

grey  of  the  water,  and  so  consoling  an  air  as  of 
immortal  twilight  and  the  peace  of  its  dreams. 

I  had  been  in  no  haste  to  leave  Inishmore,  but 
I  was  still  more  loth  to  leave  Inishmaan;  and  I 
think  that  it  was  with  reluctance  on  the  part  of  all 
of  us  that  we  made  our  way  to  the  curragh  which 
was  waiting  for  us  in  the  water.  The  islanders 
waved  their  caps,  and  called  many  good  blessings 
after  us  as  we  were  rowed  back  to  the  hooker, 
which  again  lifted  sail  and  set  out  for  the  third  and 
smallest  island,  Inisheer,  that  is,  the  South  Island. 

We  set  out  confidently,  but  when  we  had  got 
out  of  shelter  of  the  shore,  the  hooker  began  to  rise 
and  fall  with  some  violence;  and  by  the  time  we 
had  come  within  landing  distance  of  Inisheer  the 
waves  were  dashing  upon  us  with  so  great  an 
energy  that  it  was  impossible  to  drop  anchor,  and 
our  skipper  advised  us  not  to  try  to  get  to  land.  A 
curragh  set  out  from  the  shore,  and  came  some 
way  towards  us,  riding  the  waves.  It  might  have 
been  possible,  I  doubt  not,  to  drop  by  good  luck 
from  the  rolling  side  of  the  hooker  into  the  pitching 
bottom  of  the  curragh,  and  without  capsizing  the 
curragh ;  but  the  chances  were  against  it.  Tom 
Joyce,  holding  on  to  the  ropes  of  the  main-sail, 
and  the  most  seaman-like  of  us,  in  the  stern,  shouted 
at  each  other  above  the  sound  of  the  wind.  We 
were  anxious  to  make  for  Ballyline,  the  port  nearest 
to  Listoonvarna,  on  the  coast  of  Clare;  but  this 
Joyce  declared  to  be  impossible  in  such  a  sea,  and 
with  such  a  wind,  and  advised  that  we  should  make 
326 


The  Islands  of  Aran. 

for  Ballyvaughan,  round  Black  Head  Point,  where 
we  should  find  a  safe  harbour.  It  was  now  about 
a  quarter  past  one,  and  we  set  out  for  Ballyvaughan 
with  the  wind  fair  behind  us.  The  hooker  rode 
well,  and  the  waves  but  rarely  came  over  the  wind- 
ward side  as  she  lay  over  towards  her  sail,  taking 
leap  after  leap  through  the  white-edged  furrows 
of  the  grey  water.  For  two  hours  and  a  half  we 
skirted  the  Clare  coast,  which  came  to  me,  and 
disappeared  from  me,  as  the  gunwale  dipped  or 
rose  on  the  leeward  side.  The  islands  were  blotted 
out  behind  us  long  before  we  had  turned  the  sheer 
corner  of  Black  Head,  the  ultimate  edge  of  Ireland, 
and  at  last  we  came  round  the  headland  into  quieter 
water,  and  so,  after  a  short  time,  into  a  Httle  harbour 
of  Ballyvaughan,  where  we  set  foot  on  land  again, 
and  drove  for  hours  along  the  Clare  coast  and  inland 
into  Galway,  under  that  sunset  of  gold  fire  and 
white  spray,  back  to  Tillyra  Castle,  where  I  felt 
the  ground  once  more  solid  under  my  feet. 

Summer,  1896, 


327 


In   Sligo. 

Rosses  Point  and  Glencar. 

Rosses  Point   is    a    village   of   pilots    and    fishing 
people,  stretching  out  seawards  in  a  long  thin  single 
line    of    thatched    and    whitewashed    houses    along 
the   branch  of  the  sea  which   goes   from  the   little 
harbour  of  Shgo  to  broaden  out  into  the  bay  beyond 
the    edge    of   Dorren's    or    Coney    Island,    and    the 
rocks  of  Dead  Man's   Point.     It  is  a  lazy  village, 
where  no  one  is  very  rich  or  very  poor,  but  all  are 
able,  without  too  much  exertion,  to  make  just  enough 
not  to  need  to  work  any  harder.     The  people  are 
slow,    sturdy,    contented    people,    with    a    singular 
dislike   of  doing   anything   for   money,   except   that 
they  let  rooms  during  the  summer  to  the  people  of 
Shgo,   who  make  it  their  watering-place,   going  in 
and  out  daily,  when  needful,  on  the  httle  paddle- 
steamer  which  plies  backward  and  forward  between 
Sligo  and  the  Point,  or  on  the  long  car  which  takes 
in    their    messages    and    their    ma,rketing-baskets. 
Very  few  people  from  the  outer  world  ever  find  their 
way  here;    and  there  are  peasants  living  at  the  far 
end  of  the  village  who  have  never  been  so  far  as 
the  village  of  Lower  Rosses,  on  the  other  side  of 
the   green    lands.     They    know   more   of  the    coast 
of  Spain,  the  River  Plate,  and  the  Barbadoes  than 
they  know  of  the  other  side  of  their  own  mountains, 
for  seafaring  men  go  far.     I  have  just  been  talking 
with  a  seaman,  now  a  pilot  here,  who  has  told  me 
of  Venice  and  of  the  bull-fights  he  saw  at  Huelva, 
and   of  Antwerp,    and    the    Riga,    and    Le   Havre; 
328 


In  Sligo. 

and  of  the  coast  of  Cornwall,  and  Milford  Haven, 
and  the  Firth  of  Forth ;  and  of  America  and  the 
West  Indies.  Yesterday  I  saw  a  bright  green  parrot 
on  a  child's  hand ;  they  have  been  telling  me  of 
"the  black  girl"  who  came  here  from  some  foreign 
ship  and  lived  here,  and  knew  better  than  any  one 
else  where  to  find  the  plovers'  eggs ;  and  I  have 
seen  the  rim  of  a  foreign  ship,  rising  out  of  the  sand 
at  low  tide,  which  was  wrecked  here  seventy  years 
ago,  and  is  now  turning  green  under  the  water. 

Men  and  women,  here  at  the  Point,  loiter  about 
all  day  long ;  there  are  benches  outside  most  of 
the  cabins,  and  they  sit  there,  or  on  the  low,  rough 
wall  which  skirts  the  road,  or  on  the  big  stones  at 
the  edge  of  the  water,  or  upon  the  green  lands. 
Most  of  the  women  are  bare-headed,  none  go 
barefoot,  and  only  a  few  of  the  poorer  children. 
And  the  children  here  are  very  proud.  They  will 
row  you  about  all  day  for  nothing,  but  they  will 
not  bring  you  a  can  of  water  from  the  well  if  you 
pay  them  for  it.  That  is  a  point  of  view  they  have 
learnt  from  their  parents,  and  it  seems  to  me  a 
simple  and  sufficing  one.  For  these  people  have 
attained  comfort,  a  certain  dignity  (that  dignity 
which  comes  from  concerning  yourself  only  with 
what  concerns  you),  and  they  have  the  privilege  of 
living  in  a  beautiful,  harmonious  place,  without 
any  of  the  distractions  which  harass  poorer  or  less 
contented  people  in  towns,  and  keep  them  from 
the  one  thing  worth  living  for,  the  leisure  to  know 
oneself.     This  fine  laziness  of  theirs  in  the  open  air, 

329 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

with  the  constant,  subduing  sense  of  the  sea's  peril, 
its  hold  upon  their  hves  and  fortunes,  moulds  them 
often  into  a  self-sufficing  manliness,  a  hardy  woman- 
hood ;  sometimes  it  makes  them  dreamers,  and 
they  see  fairies  and  hear  the  fairy  piper  calling  in 
the  caves. 

How,  indeed,  is  it  possible  that  they  should  not 
see  more  of  the  other  world  than  most  folk  do,  and 
catch  dreams  in  their  nets  ?  For  it  is  a  place  of 
dreams,  a  grey,  gentle  place,  where  the  sand  melts 
into  the  sea,  the  sea  into  the  sky,  and  the  mountains 
and  the  clouds  drift  one  into  the  other.  I  have 
never  seen  so  friendly  a  sea  nor  a  sea  so  full  of  the 
ecstasy  of  sleep.  On  one  of  those  luminous  grey 
days,  which  are  the  true  atmosphere  of  the  place, 
it  is  like  being  in  an  eternal  morning  of  twilight  to 
wander  over  the  undulating  green  lands,  fringed 
at  the  shore  by  a  soft  rim  of  bent,  a  pale  honey- 
coloured  green,  and  along  the  delicate  grey  sands, 
from  Dead  Man's  Point  to  the  point  of  the  Third 
Rosses.  The  sea  comes  in  softly,  rippling  against 
the  sand  with  a  low  plashing,  which  even  on  very 
warm  days  has  a  cool  sound  and  a  certain  gentleness 
even  on  days  of  rough  weather.  The  headland 
of  Roughley  O 'Byrne  runs  on,  a  wavering  hne  of 
faint  green,  from  the  dark  and  cloudy  masses  of 
the  Lissadell  woods  into  the  hesitating  line  of  the 
grey  waters.  On  the  other  side  of  the  bay  Dorren's 
Island  curves  around,  almost  like  part  of  the  semi- 
circle of  the  mainland,  its  sickle-point  leaning  out 
towards  the  white  lighthouse,  which  rises  up  out  of 
330 


In  Sligo. 

the  water  like  a  phantom,  or  the  stone  image  of 
a  wave  that  has  risen  up  out  of  the  sea  on  a  day 
of  storm.  Faint  mountains  ghmmer  out  to  sea, 
many-coloured  mountains  close  in  upon  the  land, 
shutting  it  off  from  the  world  of  strange  cities. 
And  if  you  go  a  little  in  from  the  sea-edge,  over 
the  green  lands,  you  will  come  to  a  great  pool, 
where  the  waters  are  never  troubled  nor  the 
reeds  still ;  but  there  is  always  a  sighing  of  wind 
in  the  reeds,  as  of  a  very  gentle  and  melancholy 
peace. 

Go  on  a  little  farther  still,  and  you  come  to  the 
fighting  village  of  Magherow,  where  the  men  are 
red-bearded,  fierce,  great  shouters,  and  not  readier 
to  row  than  to  do  battle  with  their  oars.  They 
come  into  Rosses  Point,  generally,  at  the  regatta; 
and  at  that  time  the  Point  is  at  its  livehest,  there  is 
much  whisky  drunk,  and  many  quarrels  flame  up. 
There  is  a  great  dance,  too,  most  years,  at  the  time 
of  the  regatta.  It  is  known  as  the  cake  dance,  and 
not  so  long  ago  a  cake  and  a  bottle  of  whisky  were 
hung  out  of  a  window  by  green  ribbons,  the  cake 
for  the  best  woman  dancer  and  the  bottle  of  whisky 
for  the  best  man  dancer.  Now  there  is  no  cake 
at  all,  and  if  there  is  much  whisky,  it  is  handed 
over  the  counter  in  big  glasses,  and  not  hung  out 
of  the  window  by  green  ribbons.  The  prize  now 
is  money,  and  so  the  people  of  the  Point,  with  their 
fine,  independent  objection  to  doing  anything  for 
money,  are  less  ready  to  show  off  their  notable 
powers  of  dancing ;    and  the  women,  who,  besides, 

331 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

are  getting  to  prefer  the  waltzes  and  quadrilles  of 
the  towns,  will  not  take  part  in  the  dance  at  all. 

The  regatta  this  year  was  not  too  well  managed, 
having  passed  out  of  the  hands  of  the  village  pilots ; 
and  it  was  unwisely  decided  that  the  dance  should 
be  held  the  same  evening,  outside  the  door  of  a 
public-house  where  the  crews  of  the  losing  boats 
had  been  drinking  at  the  expense  of  the  captains 
of  the  winning  boats.  It  was  very  dark,  and  there 
was  a  great  crowd,  a  great  confusion.  A  somewhat 
battered  door  had  been  laid  down  for  the  dancing, 
and  the  press  of  people  kept  swaying  in  upon  the 
narrow  limits  of  the  door,  where  only  a  few  half- 
tipsy  fellows  pounded  away,  lurching  into  one 
another's  arms.  Everybody  swayed,  and  yelled, 
and  encouraged,  and  expostulated,  and  the  melodion 
sounded  fitfully ;  and  presently  the  door  was  pulled 
from  under  the  feet  of  the  dancers  and  the  police 
shouldered  into  the  midst  of  what  would  soon  have 
been  a  very  pretty  fight.  The  dance  was  postponed 
to  Monday,  when  some  of  the  boats  were  to  race 
again. 

On  Monday,  at  about  half-past  six,  I  met  eight 
small  boys  carrying  a  large  door  upon  their  shoulders. 
They  were  coming  up  through  the  village  to  the 
green  lands,  where  they  laid  down  the  door  on  the 
grass.  About  an  hour  afterwards,  as  it  began  to 
get  very  dark,  the  people  came  slowly  up  from  the 
village,  and  a  wide  ring  was  made  by  a  rope  carried 
around  stakes  set  in  the  earth,  and  the  people 
gathered   about   the   ring,   in    the    middle  of  which 


In  Sligo. 

lay  the  door,  lit  on  one  side  by  a  ship's  lantern  and 
on  the  other  by  the  lamp  of  a  bicycle.  A  chair 
was  put  for  the  judge,  who  was  a  pilot  and  a  publican, 
and  one  of  the  few  Gaehc  speakers  in  the  village, 
and  a  man  of  few  words,  and  a  man  of  weight; 
and  another  chair  was  put  for  the  musician,  who 
played  on  the  melodion,  an  instrument  which  has 
long  since  replaced  the  fiddle  as  the  national  instru- 
ment of  Ireland.  A  row  of  very  small  children  lay 
along  the  grass  inside  the  rope,  the  girls  in  one  place, 
the  boys  in  another.  It  was  so  dark  that  I  could 
only  vaguely  distinguish,  in  a  curve  of  very  black 
shadow,  the  people  opposite  to  me  in  the  circle, 
and  presently  it  began  to  rain  a  little  and  still  we 
waited.  At  last  a  man  came  forward,  and  the 
musician  began  to  play  a  Hvely  tune  on  his  melodion, 
keeping  time  with  his  feet,  and  there  was  a  great 
cry  of  "Gallagher!  Gallagher!"  and  much  shout- 
ing and  whistling.  It  was  a  shepherd  from  Lower 
Rosses,  a  thin  and  solemn  young  man,  who  began 
to  dance  with  great  vigour  and  regularity,  tapping 
heavily  on  the  rough  boards  with  very  rough  and 
heavy  boots.  He  danced  several  step-dances,  and 
was  much  applauded.  Then,  after  a  pause,  an  old 
man  from  the  Point,  Redmond  Bruen  by  name, 
a  pilot,  who  had  very  cunningly  won  the  duck-hunt 
at  the  regatta,  stepped  forward  unevenly,  and  began 
to  walk  about  on  the  door,  shuffling  his  feet,  bowing 
to  right  and  left,  and  waving  a  stick  that  he  held 
in  his  hand.  "When  he's  sober,  he's  a  great 
dancer,"    we    were    assured.     He    was    not    sober, 

333 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  at  first  did  no  more  than  shuffle.  Then  he 
stopped,  seemed  to  recollect  himself,  and  the  reputa- 
tion he  had  to  keep  up,  and  with  more  bowing  to 
the  public,  began  to  sing,  with  variations,  a  song 
popular  among  the  Irish  peasants,  "On  the  Rocky 
Road  to  Dublin."  It  is  a  dramatic  song,  and  after 
every  stanza  he  acted,  in  his  dance,  the  fight  on 
the  road,  the  passage  from  Holyhead,  and  the  other 
stirring  incidents  of  the  song.  The  old  man 
swayed  there  in  the  vague  light,  between  the  two 
lanterns,  a  whimsical  and  pathetic  figure,  with  his 
grey  beard,  his  helpless  gestures,  and  the  random 
gaiety  of  his  legs ;  he  danced  with  a  wonderful 
lightness,  and  one  could  but  just  hear  his  boots 
passing  over  the  boards. 

We  applauded  him  with  enthusiasm,  and  he 
came  and  sat  on  the  grass  inside  the  ring,  near  the 
children,  who  were  gradually  creeping  closer  in; 
and  his  place  was  taken  by  the  serious  Gallagher, 
who  was  quite  sober,  and  who  pounded  away  like 
clockwork,  holding  his  body  quite  stiff',  and  ratthng 
his  boots  with  great  agility.  The  old  man  watched 
him  keenly,  and  presently  got  up  and  made  for  the 
door  again.  He  began  to  dance,  stopped,  flung  ofi^ 
his  coat,  and  set  off"  again  with  a  certain  elaboration, 
variety,  and  even  delicacy  in  his  dancing,  which 
would  have  won  him  the  prize,  I  think,  if  he  had 
been  sober  enough  to  make  the  most  of  his  qualities. 
He  at  least  thoroughly  appreciated  his  own  skill. 
"That's  a  good  reel,"  he  would  say  when  he  halted 
for  breath  and  emphasis. 
334 


In  Sligo. 

Meanwhile  Gallagher  was  looking  for  a  partner, 
and  one  or  two  young  fellows  took  the  boards, 
and  did  each  a  single  dance,  in  pairs  or  singly. 
Then  a  young  man  who,  Hke  Bruen,  was  "a  grand 
dancer  when  sober,"  but  who  was  even  less  sober 
than  Bruen,  reeled  across  the  grass,  kicked  over  one 
of  the  lanterns,  and  began  to  dance  opposite  Galla- 
gher. Then  he  pushed  Gallagher  off  the  board 
and  danced  by  himself.  He  was  in  his  shirt-sleeves 
and  without  hat  or  collar,  and  much  of  his  dance 
was  merely  an  unsteady  walking.  He  stopped 
frequently,  and  appeared  to  think ;  and,  after  much 
thinking,  it  occurred  to  him  that  it  was  the  music 
which  would  not  keep  time  with  his  dancing.  So 
he  walked  up  to  the  musician,  snatched  the  melodion 
away  from  him,  and  marched  off  with  it,  I  suppose 
to  find  another  player.  He  passed  into  the  dark- 
ness ;  the  melodion  in  his  hands  squealed  out  of 
the  darkness.  Then  he  came  back  dangling  it, 
and  was  told  to  give  it  back  again,  which  he  did 
sulkily,  with  exactly  the  look  and  gesture  of  a 
naughty  child  who  has  been  called  to  order.  And 
then  Gallagher  came  forward  again,  and,  taking 
off  his  hat,  said  he  would  sing  a  song.  He  got 
through  a  verse  or  two,  chanting  gravely  in  a  kind 
of  sing-song,  and  then,  coming  to  the  line,  "And 
he  said  to  the  landlord,"  paused,  and  said,  *'I  am 
not  able  to  do  any  more."  There  was  a  great 
laugh,  and  Gallagher  returned  to  his  dancing,  in 
which  he  was  presently  joined  by  a  new  rival. 
Gallagher  got  the  prize. 

335 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

I  was  told  that  so  poor  a  dance  had  not  been 
seen  before  at  Rosses  Point,  and  the  blame  was  laid 
on  new  ways,  and  the  coming  of  the  waltzes  and 
quadrilles,  and  the  folly  of  young  people  who  think 
old  things  not  good  enough  for  them.  And  the 
old  people  shook  their  heads  that  night  over  the 
turf  fires  in  their  cabins. 

Seven  miles  inland  from  Rosses  Point  the  moun- 
tains open,  and,  entering  a  great  hollow  called  the 
Windy  Gap,  you  come  upon  a  small  lake  with  green 
fields  around  it  and  mountains  full  of  woods  and 
waterfalls  rising  up  behind  it.  This  is  Glencar, 
and  there  is  a  cabin  by  the  side  of  the  lake  where 
I  spent  a  few  enchanted  days  of  rain  and  sunshine, 
wandering  over  the  mountain-side  and  among  the 
wild  and  delicate  woods.  Above  the  cabin  there  is 
a  great  mountain,  and  the  woods  climb  from  about 
the  cabin  to  almost  the  summit  of  the  mountain. 
Fir  trees  rise  up  like  marching  banners,  line  upon 
line;  between  them  the  foliage  is  softer,  green 
moss  grows  on  the  tree-trunks  and  ferns  out  of  the 
moss ;  quicken-berries  flame  on  the  heights  above 
the  streams ;  the  many-coloured  green  of  leaves  is 
starred  with  bright  orange,  shadowed  with  spectral 
blue,  clouded  with  the  exquisite  ashen  pallor  of 
decaying  heather.  Rocky  steps  lead  from  height 
to  height  along  the  edge  of  chasms  veiled  with  leafy 
branches,  and  there  is  always  a  sound  of  many 
waters,  falling  in  torrents  down  black  stairways  of 
rock,  and  rushing  swiftly  along  narrow  passages 
336 


In  Sligo. 

between  grass  and  ferns.  Here  and  there  a  bridge 
of  fallen  trunks,  set  roughly  together,  and  covered 
with  the  adventurous  soil,  which,  in  these  parts, 
bears  fruit  wherever  it  has  an  inch  to  chng  to, 
crosses  a  waterfall  just  above  the  actual  descent. 
Winding  paths  branch  off  in  every  direction,  and 
in  the  soft  earth  of  these  narrow  and  precipitous 
ways  one  can  see  little  hoof-prints,  and  occasionally 
one  meets  a  donkey  going  slowly  uphill,  with  the 
creels  on  its  back,  to  fetch  turf  from  the  bog.  And 
always  there  is  the  sound  of  water,  hke  the  cool 
singing  voice  of  the  rocks,  above  the  sound  of 
rustling  leaves,  and  birds  piping,  and  the  flapping 
of  great  wings,  which  are  the  voices  of  the  many- 
instrumented  orchestra  of  the  woods.  Here  one 
is  in  the  heart  of  the  mountains  and  in  the  heart  of 
the  forest ;  and,  wandering  along  a  grassy  path 
at  evening,  one  seems  to  be  very  close  to  something 
very  ancient  and  secret. 

The  mountains  here  are  whole  regions,  and  when 
you  have  climbed  to  their  summit  through  the 
woods,  you  find  yourself  on  a  vast  plain,  and  this 
plain  stretches  so  far  that  it  seems  to  fill  the  horizon 
and  you  cannot  see  anything  on  the  other  side  of 
it.  Looking  down  into  the  valley,  which  seems 
scooped  out  of  the  solid  mountains,  you  can  see, 
on  the  other  side  of  the  Windy  Gap,  the  thin  line 
of  Rosses  Point  going  out  into  the  sea,  and  the  sea 
stretches  out  so  far  before  it  reaches  the  horizon 
that  you  can  catch  a  yellow  glimmer  of  sunlight, 
lying  out  beyond  the  horizon  visible  from  the  shore. 

337 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

The  fields,  around  and  beyond  the  pohshed  mirror 
of  the  lake,  seem,  in  their  patchwork  of  greens  and 
browns,  like  a  little  map  of  the  world.  The 
mountain-top,  which  you  have  fancied  from  below 
to  be  such  solid  ground,  proves,  if  you  try  to  cross 
it,  to  be  a  great  yielding  bog,  with  intervals  of  rock 
or  hard  soil.  To  walk  over  it  is  to  move  in  short 
jumps,  with  an  occasional  longer  leap  across  a 
dried-up  watercourse.  I  like  the  voluptuous  soft- 
ness of  the  bog,  for  one's  feet  sink  luxuriously  into 
even  the  pale  golden  mounds  of  moss  which  rise 
between  the  rusty  heather  and  starveling  grasses 
of  the  sheer  morass.  And  it  has  the  treachery 
which  is  always  one  of  the  allurements  of  voluptuous 
things.  Nor  is  it  the  bog  only  which  is  treacher- 
ous on  these  mountains.  The  mist  comes  down  on 
them  very  suddenly,  and  in  that  white  darkness 
even  the  natives  sometimes  lose  their  way,  and  are 
drawn  over  the  sheer  edge  of  the  mountain.  My 
host  has  just  come  in  to  tell  me  that  last  night  there 
was  a  great  brewing  of  poteen  on  Ben  Bulben,  and 
that  many  of  the  drinkers  wandered  all  night, 
losing  their  way  in  the  mist,  and  that  one  of  them, 
not  having  the  drunkard's  luck,  fell  over  a  rocky 
place,  and  is  now  lying  dead  on  the  mountain. 

I  had  been  thinking  of  such  possibilities  yester- 
day as  I  cHmbed,  peak  after  peak,  the  mountains 
on  the  other  side  of  the  lake.  Cope's  Mountain, 
Lugnagall,  Cashlagall,  Cragnamoona.  They  are 
bare  and  treeless,  crossed  by  a  few  donkey-tracks, 
and  I  sometimes  deserted  these  looped  and  coiling 
338 


In  Sligo. 

ways  for  the  more  hazardous  directness  of  the  dry 
watercourses  which  seam  the  mountains  from  head 
to  foot.  Once  at  the  top,  you  look  over  almost 
the  whole  county,  lying  out  in  a  green  plain,  ridged 
with  hedges,  clustered  with  woods,  glittering  with 
lakes ;  here  and  there  a  white  cabin,  a  scattered 
village,  and  just  below,  in  the  hollow  of  the  land 
and  water,  the  little  curving  grey  town  of  Sligo, 
with  its  few  ships  resting  in  harbour,  and  beyond 
them  the  long  black  line  which  is  Rosses  Point, 
and  then  the  sea,  warm  with  sunlight,  and,  as  if 
islanded  in  the  sea,  the  hills  of  Mayo.  I  have 
never  seen  anything  resembling  the  view  from  these 
mountains ;  I  have  never  seen  anything,  in  its 
way,  more  beautiful.  And  when,  last  night,  after 
a  tossed  and  blood-red  sunset,  the  white  mist 
curdled  about  the  heads  of  Ben  Bulben  and  Knock- 
narea,  and  a  faint,  luminous  mist  filled  the  whole 
hollow  of  the  valley,  there  seemed  to  be  a  mingling 
of  all  the  worlds ;  and  the  world  in  which  ships 
went  out  from  the  harbour  of  Sligo,  and  the  poteen- 
makers  wandered  over  the  mountain,  was  not  more 
real  than  the  world  of  embodied  dreams  in  which 
the  fairies  dance  in  their  forts,  or  beat  at  the  cabin 
doors,  or  chuckle  among  the  reeds. 

Summer,  1896. 


339 


From  a  Castle  in  Ireland. 

In  the  mysterious  castle,  lost  among  trees  that 
start  up  suddenly  around  it,  out  of  a  land  of  green 
meadows  and  grey  stones,  where  I  have  been  so 
dehghtfully  living  through  the  difficult  month  of 
August,  London,  and  books,  and  one's  daily  habits 
seem  scarcely  appreciable ;  too  far  away  on  the 
other  side  of  this  mountainous  land  enclosing  one 
within  the  circle  of  its  own  magic.  It  is  a  castle 
of  dreams,  where,  in  the  morning,  I  climb  the 
winding  staircase  in  the  tower,  creep  through  the 
secret  passage,  and  find  myself  in  the  vast  deserted 
room  above  the  chapel,  which  is  my  retiring-room 
for  meditation ;  or,  following  the  winding  staircase, 
come  out  on  the  battlements,  where  I  can  look 
widely  across  Galway  to  the  hills.  In  the  evening 
my  host  plays  Vittoria  and  Palestrina  on  the  organ, 
in  the  half  darkness  of  the  hall,  and  I  wander  between 
the  pillars  of  black  marble,  hearing  the  many 
voices  rising  into  the  dome :  Vittoria,  the  many 
lamentable  human  voices,  crying  on  the  sins  of  the 
world,  the  vanity  of  pleasant  sins ;  Palestrina,  an 
exultation  and  a  triumph,  in  which  the  many  voices 
of  white  souls  go  up  ardently  into  heaven.  In  the 
afternoon  we  drive  through  a  strange  land,  which 
has  the  desolation  of  ancient  and  dwindling  things ; 
a  grey  land,  into  which  human  life  comes  rarely, 
and  with  a  certain  primitive  savager}^  As  we  drive 
seawards,  the  stone  walls  closing  in  the  woods 
dwindle  into  low,  roughly  heaped  hedges  of  un- 
mortared    stones,    over    which    only  an    occasional 

340 


From  a  Castle  in  Ireland. 

cluster  of  trees  lifts  itself;  and  the  trees  strain 
wildly  in  the  air,  writhing  away  from  the  side  of 
the  sea,  where  the  winds  from  the  Atlantic  have 
blown  upon  them  and  transfixed  them  in  an  eternity 
of  flight  from  an  eternal  flagellation.  As  far  as 
one  can  see,  as  far  as  the  blue,  barren  mountains 
which  rise  up  against  the  horizon,  there  are  these 
endless  tracks  of  harsh  meadow-land,  marked  into 
squares  by  the  stone  hedges,  and  themselves  heaped 
with  rocks  and  stones,  lying  about  like  some  grey 
fungus  growth.  Not  a  sign  of  human  life  is  to  be 
seen;  at  long  intervals  we  pass  a  cabin,  white- 
washed, thatched  roughly,  with  stopped-up  windows 
and  a  half-closed  door,  from  behind  which  a  grey- 
haired  old  woman  will  gaze  at  you  with  her  steady, 
melancholy  eyes.  A  few  peasants  pass  on  the  road, 
moving  sombrely,  without  speaking ;  the  men,  for 
the  most  part,  touch  their  hats,  without  change  of 
expression ;  the  women,  drawing  their  shawls 
about  their  faces,  merely  look  at  you,  with  a  slow, 
scrutinising  air,  more  indiff"erent  than  curious. 
The  women  walk  bare-footed  and  with  the  admirable 
grace  and  straightness  of  all  who  go  with  bare  feet. 
I  remember,  in  the  curve  of  a  rocky  field,  some 
little  way  in  from  the  road,  seeing  a  young  woman 
wearing  a  blue  bodice,  a  red  petticoat,  and  a  grey 
shawl,  carrying  a  tin  pail  on  her  head,  with  that 
straight,  flexible  movement  of  the  body,  that  slow 
and  formal  grace  of  Eastern  women  who  have 
carried  pitchers  from  the  well.  Occasionally  a 
fierce  old  man  on  a  horse,  wearing  the  old  costume, 

341 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

that  odd,  precise  kind  of  dress-coat,  passes  you 
with  a  surly  scowl ;  or  a  company  of  tinkers  (the 
Irish  gipsies,  one  might  call  them)  trail  past,  huddled 
like  crouching  beasts  on  their  little,  rough,  open 
carts,  driving  a  herd  of  donkeys  before  them.  As 
we  get  nearer  the  village  by  the  sea,  the  cabins 
become  larger  and  more  frequent ;  and  just  before 
reaching  it  we  pass  a  ruined  castle,  impregnably 
built  on  a  green  mound,  looking  over  the  water  to 
the  quay,  where  the  thin  black  masts  of  a  few  vessels 
rise  motionless  against  the  little  whitewashed  houses. 
The  road  goes  down  a  steep  hill,  and  turns  sharply, 
in  the  midst  of  the  grey  village,  with  its  thatched 
and  ragged  roofs.  The  doors  all  stand  open,  the 
upper  windows  are  drawn  half  down,  and  from 
some  of  them  I  see  a  dishevelled  dark  head,  the 
hair  and  eyes  of  a  gipsy  (one  could  well  have  fancied), 
looking  down  on  the  road  and  the  passers-by.  As 
the  road  rises  again,  we  see  the  blue  mountains 
coming  nearer  to  us,  and  the  place  where,  one 
knows,  is  Galway  Bay,  lying  too  low  for  any  flash 
of  the  waters.  Now  we  are  quite  near  the  sea,  and 
in  front  of  the  house  we  are  to  visit  (you  will  hear 
all  about  it  in  M.  Bourget's  next  nouvelle),  a  brown 
mass  of  colour  comes  suddenly  into  the  dull  green 
and  grey  of  the  fields,  and  one  smells  the  seaweed 
lying  there  in  the  pools. 

I  find  all  this  bareness,  greyness,  monotony, 
solitude  at  once  primitive  and  fantastical,  curiously 
attractive,  giving  just  the  same  kind  of  relief  from 
the  fat,  luxurious  English  landscape  that  these 
342 


From  a  Castle  in  Ireland. 

gaunt,  nervous,  long-chinned  peasants  give  from 
the  red  and  roUing  sleepiness  of  the  EngUsh  villager. 
And  there  is  a  quite  national  vivacity  and  variety 
of  mood  in  the  skies  here,  in  the  restless  atmosphere, 
the  humorous  exaggerations  of  the  sun  and  rain. 
To-day  is  a  typical  Irish  day,  soft,  warm,  grey, 
with  intervals  of  rain  and  fine  weather;  I  can  see 
a  sort  of  soft  mist  of  rain,  blown  loosely  about 
between  the  trees  of  the  park,  the  clouds  an  almost 
luminous  grey,  the  sun  shining  through  them;  at 
their  darkest,  scarcely  darker  than  the  Irish  stone 
of  which  the  castle  is  built.  Driving,  the  other  day, 
we  passed  a  large  pool  among  the  rocks,  in  the  midst 
of  those  meadows  flowering  with  stones ;  the  sky 
was  black  with  the  rain  that  was  falling  upon  the 
hills,  and  the  afternoon  sun  shone  against  the  deep 
blackness  of  the  sky  and  the  shadowed  blackness 
of  the  water.  I  have  never  seen  such  coloured 
darkness  as  this  water;  green  passing  into  slate, 
slate  into  purple,  purple  into  dead  black.  And  it 
was  all  luminous,  floating  there  in  the  harbour  of 
the  grass  like  a  tideless  sea.  Then  there  is  the 
infinite  variety  of  the  mountains,  sloping  in  uneven 
lines  around  almost  the  whole  horizon.  They  are 
as  variable  as  the  clouds,  and,  while  you  look  at 
them,  have  changed  from  a  purple  darkness  to  a 
luminous  and  tender  green,  and  then  into  a  hfeless 
grey,  and  seem  to  float  towards  you  and  drift  away 
from  you  hke  the  clouds. 

Among  these  soHd   and  shifting  things,  in  this 
castle  which  is  at  once  so  ancient  a  reality  and  so 

343 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

essential  a  dream,  I  feel  myself  to  be  in  some  danger 
of  loosening  the  tightness  of  my  hold  upon  external 
things,  of  foregoing  many  delectable  pleasures,  of 
forgetting  many  things  that  I  have  passionately 
learnt  in  cities.  If  I  lived  here  too  long  I  should 
forget  that  I  live  in  London  and  remember  that  I 
am  a  Cornishman. 


Summer,  1896. 


344 


Dover  Cliffs. 

I. 

Nature  made  Dover  for  her  pleasure,  and  man 
has  remade  Dover  for  his  use.  The  cHfFs  have 
been  tunnelled  within  and  fortified  overhead ;  the 
sea  has  been  bound  inside  a  vast  harbour,  and  driven 
back  to  make  way  for  trucks  and  trolleys  to  carry 
stones  for  its  prison  walls ;  the  smoke  of  funnels 
has  superseded  the  gentle  motions  of  sails ;  there 
are  forts  and  barracks  and  prisons,  like  great  ware- 
houses for  human  goods ;  everywhere  there  is 
action,  change,  energy;  there  are  foreign  faces, 
people  coming  and  going  from  the  ends  of  the 
earth,  to  whom  Dover  is  a  stepping-stone ;  and  it 
is  a  gate,  which  can  be  opened  to  friends  and  closed 
on  enemies.  A  gate  of  England,  one  of  the  Cinque 
Ports  and  the  only  one  of  them  that  has  held  its 
own;  it  has  always  been  a  part  of  history;  it  is 
our  only  port  which  has  a  natural  magnificence 
and  a  great  tradition. 

The  sea  at  Dover,  since  the  Admiralty  has  looped 
it  in  with  its  stone  barriers,  can  hardly  be  said  to 
have  remained  a  quite  wholly  natural  part  of  nature 
any  longer.  It  has  been  tamed,  brought  to  serve 
man  meekly,  and  not  at  its  own  will.  By  day  we 
see  the  gap  in  its  prison  walls,  and  the  ships  going 
in  and  out,  to  be  caught  or  loosed.  But  by  night 
there  is  the  aspect  of  a  lake,  and  the  gold  and  red 
and  green  lights  that  go  in  a  semicircle  about  it 
seem  Hke  Hghts  outHning  a  curving  shore.  The 
execrable    British    pleasure-pier,   with    the    "looped 

345 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

and  windowed  nakedness"  of  its  bulbed  head 
thrust,  impudently  ghttering,  into  the  water,  adds 
the  last  sign  to  the  deeper  signs  of  man's  domination. 
Yet,  by  day  or  night,  if  you  listen,  you  will  hear  the 
Hsp  of  water  on  the  pebbles,  in  a  faint,  powerless 
affirmation :  you  will  know,  in  that  faint  sound, 
the  sea's  voice.  But  to  see  the  sea,  really  itself, 
and  to  hear  it  speak  out  at  its  own  pleasure,  you 
must  stand  on  the  stone  wall  which  binds  it  in  from 
the  west  wind,  or  look  down  from  the  cliffs,  on 
west  or  east.  The  cliffs  share  in  its  liberty ;  they 
have  never  consented  to  its  bondage ;  they  endure 
its  buffetings  with  patience,  as  friendly  losers  do 
in  a  game.  When  the  wind  freshens  and  the  water 
is  whipped  from  green  to  white,  and  leaps  at  and 
over  the  great  stone  pier  of  the  Admiralty  in  showers 
of  white  foam,  the  cliffs  above  it  turn  to  the  colour 
of  thunder-clouds.  Under  a  faint  mist  cliffs  and 
sea  suffer  a  new  enchantment ;  a  bloom  comes  out 
over  them,  seeming  to  melt  them  into  a  single  in- 
tangible texture.  And  cliffs  and  sea,  in  sun  or 
storm,  are  at  one  :  the  sea,  the  witch  of  destiny,  at 
all  her  passes,  and  the  cliffs,  English  women,  white 
and  tall  and  delicately  shaped. 

The  loveliest  of  the  cliffs  is  that  one  which  should 
no  longer  be  called  Shakespeare's,  for  it  has  been 
desecrated  by  a  foul  black  tunnel  and  the  smoke  of 
engines,  and  a  railway-train,  which  has  devastated 
the  beach,  goes  through  the  tunnel  to  a  bay  beyond 
where  a  black  chimney  gapes  at  the  mouth  of  a 
problematical  coal-mine.  This  is  one  of  the  worst 
346 


Dover  Cliffs. 

things  which  man  has  done  here  in  his  struggle 
to  subdue  nature.  A  harbour  may  add  less  beauty 
than  it  takes  from  the  sea ;  but  it  is  a  vast,  kind, 
friendly  thing  in  which  the  sea  is  not  unwilling  to 
co-operate.  A  harbour  is  that  refuge  in  which 
ships  that  have  come  there  from  the  ends  of  the 
world  lie  at  rest :  men  have  built  it  for  them.  But 
here,  for  the  moment,  man  has  beaten  and  defaced 
nature;  beauty  has  been  baffled,  so  far  as  man 
can  do  it.  For  the  sea  remains,  and  the  cliff  is  still 
a  white  eminence,  with  a  few  pebbles  at  its  feet 
and  a  thin  green  covering  on  its  back.  Broken 
beauty  is  remembered  even  after  it  has  been  utterly 
destroyed;  and  man  and  his  works  have  their  day 
and  pass  over.  Here,  too,  nature  will  outlast  him; 
and  the  sea  waits,  knowing  that  she  will  one  day  have 
her  revenge  on  these  sorry  makings  of  his  hands. 

11. 

It  is  the  cliffs  that  make  the  best  beauty  of 
Dover.  They  are  her  crown,  her  support,  her 
defence ;  they  hold  her  in  their  arms  as  she  sits, 
white  and  long,  with  her  feet  in  the  sea.  They  are 
beautiful,  at  all  hours,  with  their  white  walls  and  the 
bare  green  and  brown  of  their  downs ;  they  are 
like  fortresses,  calm,  assured,  steadfast,  and  ready 
to  become  impregnable.  Everywhere  towers,  walls, 
the  heavy,  square  castle,  suggest  ancient  defences ; 
and  the  friendliness  of  the  cliffs  to  the  town,  which 
it  holds  against  the  sea,  has  a  reticence  of  manner 

347 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

towards  strangers  and  foreign  coasts.  At  night 
they  rise  mysteriously  against  the  sky,  with  rows 
and  patches  of  Hghts  shining  out  of  dull  level  walls, 
turned  now  into  candelabra  for  candles  of  gold 
fire.  The  old,  red,  gabled,  sordid  harbour,  seen 
dimly,  its  lights  striking  like  red  and  yellow  knives 
into  the  stagnant  water,  becomes  a  kind  of  fairy 
thing,  which  one  vaguely  remembers  to  have  seen 
in  foreign  lands.  Which  ?  Venice  has  no  such 
eager  cliffs  above  her  tamed  water ;  and  Venice,  for 
a  moment,  has  come  into  the  memory,  returning 
there,  as  she  does  at  most  sights  of  houses  looking 
down  into  water.  Is  it  Ahcante  ?  The  palms 
on  the  sand  are  not  here,  nothing  of  what  is  African 
in  that  rare  coast  of  Spain ;  but  I  remember  a  certain 
hkeness  in  the  hill  with  its  castle  rising  more  abruptly 
over  a  long,  curved  town  whiter  and  stranger  than 
Dover. 

To  see  Dover  as  a  whole,  you  must  stand  on  the 
stone  parapet  above  the  landing-place,  where  the 
steamers  shde  in  gently,  hardly  touching  the  quay 
with  the  wooden  roofs  over  their  propellers.  You 
must  turn  your  back  on  the  sea,  which  is  there 
really  the  sea,  and  not  an  enclosed  bay,  a  harbour 
made  for  ships  to  come  back  into;  and  you  must 
look  across  the  black  engine-smoke  of  the  trains, 
to  the  white  cliffs,  which  with  evening  turn  to  a  dull 
grey,  over  the  long  curve  of  white-fronted  houses, 
with  their  dark-green  balconies  and  flat  windows 
set  at  regular  intervals ;  going  on  beyond  them 
to  the  east,  with  many  indentations,  white,  vast, 
348 


Dover  Cliffs. 

and  delicate,  shutting  in  the  sea  with  its  high  walls, 
and  seeming  to  throw  out  long,  thin  piers  to  clutch 
and  imprison  it;  on  the  west,  Shakespeare's  Cliff, 
and  then  smoke  and  the  long  mine-chimney,  and 
the  cliffs  turn  the  corner  and  are  beyond  your  sight. 
But,  for  the  very  heart  of  Dover,  you  must  look 
under  you,  where  dock  after  dock  lies  motionless, 
its  long  arms  shut  about  its  guests. 

They  are  like  most  other  harbour-docks,  dingy, 
with  low,  irregular  houses  painted  with  signs  and 
letterings;  Hamburg-American  Line,  Hearts  of  Oak 
Dining-Rooms,  Cope's  Tobaccos.  There  are  red 
roofs  and  gables  and  an  old  sordidness  about  every- 
thing at  the  edge  of  this  pale-green  stagnant  water, 
which  never  moves  except  under  some  heavy  hull,  or 
under  the  feet  of  that  white  bird  sitting  disconsolately 
on  the  floating  buoy.  The  inner  and  outer  harbour 
has  each  its  big  ships,  stacked  side  by  side,  funnels 
and  masts  together,  against  the  same  quay  with 
the  same  little  old  gabled  low  red  houses  with  the 
same  modern  signs.  At  night  one  sees  beyond 
them  only  the  lighted  windows  of  flat  house-fronts, 
showing  nothing  in  the  darkness  but  loop-holes, 
as  if  nothing  were  behind  them.  Masts,  taut  rope- 
ladders  from  mast  to  bulwark,  furled  sails  laid  by 
in  the  sides  of  the  ship,  the  sharp  lines  of  ropes 
stretched  out  in  delicate  patterns,  it  is  these  that 
give  beauty,  even  before  the  night  has  come  with 
its  transformations,  to  this  kind  of  sea-pool  where 
vast  many-tentacled  animals  crawl,  clinging  like 
limpets  to  the  wet  walls. 

349 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

The  ship's  beauty  was  lost  when  sails  went  and 
masts  went,  and  funnels  and  boilers  took  their 
place,  as  the  modern  machine  has  taken  the  place 
of  every  beautiful  thing  that  went  on  the  wind  and 
was  worked  by  human  hands.  The  lovely  shape 
was  lost  when  great  bulges  came  for  useful  purposes 
on  either  side  of  the  carcase  which  they  trampled 
into  speed.  Figments  of  scarcely  serviceable  masts 
remain,  with  a  little  of  the  spider's  work  of  cords, 
waiting  for  sails  which  are  never  to  fly  up  and  run 
before  wind.  The  wind  is  no  longer,  for  those 
who  go  down  to  the  sea  in  ships,  more  than  an 
obstacle  or  a  danger;  it  adds  no  swiftness  to  the 
course  of  sails  flying  before  it,  but  may  delay  or 
incommode  the  steady  indiflPerent  progress  of  the 
steamer.  Does  not  its  name  betray  it  ^  the  thing 
that  steams,  a  thing  heated  from  within,  a  churner 
of  waves.  It  is  no  longer  a  ship,  which  was  a  light, 
veering  thing,  like  a  bird,  half  tamed  to  a  man's 
hand,  escaping  from  him  and  unpunctually  returning. 
Now,  as  I  see  a  Channel  steamer  move  slowly  out 
backwards  from  the  dock  and  turn  slowly  in  the 
middle  water  of  the  harbour,  I  am  reminded  rather 
of  the  vast  slowly  stepping  motion  of  elephants. 


III. 

Dover  under  all  shades  of  mists  is  personal,  up 
to  a  certain  point  beautiful.  One  night  I  saw  from 
the  window  a  thick  white  mist  come  almost  suddenly 

3SO 


Dover  Cliffs. 

out  of  the  sea;  the  lights  were  blotted  out,  the  mimic 
guns,  the  bells,  the  fog-horns,  snoring  in  different 
keys,  were  heard  all  through  the  night.  It  was 
the  intermittent  battle  going  on  between  the  stealthy- 
white  forces  and  the  resistant  brain  of  man.  The 
fog  lasted  till  early  morning,  when  a  blazing  sun, 
Uke  one  of  Blake's,  came  out  and  burned  through 
the  shivering  vapours.  On  all  the  boats  and  planks 
lying  on  the  pebbles  of  the  beach  one  saw,  still 
clinging  there,  as  the  sun  lightened  them,  a  white 
wetness  which  the  fog  had  left  on  them  Uke  some 
sea-dew. 

I  write  of  it  now  as  if  it  had  been  beautiful; 
but  I  got  my  own  share  of  discomfort  out  of  it, 
for  I  lay  awake  all  night,  unable  to  keep  my  mind 
from  counting  the  horrible  iteration  of  sounds, 
repeated  with  a  monotony  hke  that  of  some  torture, 
between  pit  and  pendulum.  Every  separate  hoot, 
shriek,  or  boom  struck  into  my  ears  with  a  steady 
violence,  hke  blow  after  blow  from  a  great  fist; 
and  what  was  most  distressing  in  it  was,  not  the 
sounds,  but  their  succession  and  the  necessity  of 
counting  them  in  my  brain,  waiting  for  them  with 
all  my  nerves.  The  big  sound,  like  the  thud  of  a 
bomb,  struck  in  with  a  measure  of  its  own,  at  slower 
intervals  than  the  hooters;  and  I  waited  with  most 
anxiety  for  that  shattering  fall  and  rebound,  whose 
place  I  could  never  quite  calculate,  between  two 
or  on  the  end  of  the  second  recurrent  gasps.  I 
covered  my  ears,  but  the  sound,  a  little  deadened, 
penetrated  them  in  the  same  dismal  rhythm;    and 

351 


Cities  and  Sea-Coasts  and  Islands. 

in  my  mind  there  was  only  a  great  emptiness,  in 
which  a  vapour  of  suspense  drifted  to  and  fro. 

But  for  those  sounds  I  should  have  been  per- 
fectly happy  in  Dover.  It  is  a  place  of  winds,  sea, 
and  cliffs;  it  is  ahve,  and  the  life  in  it  varies  with 
every  tide,  the  beauty  in  it  comes  and  goes  with 
every  change  of  hour  or  weather.  The  cramped 
beach  seems  to  have  lost  all  that  Matthew  Arnold 
found  in  it,  except  those 

edges  drear 
And  naked  shingles  of  the  world 

which  are  still  to  be  discerned  there.  And  then, 
one  day,  a  wind  brings  back  some  of  its  motion  to 
the  sea,  and  again,  with  Arnold : 

you  hear  the  grating  roar 
Of  pebbles  which  the  waves  draw  back,  and  fling, 
At  their  return,  up  the  high  strand, 
Begin,  and  cease,  and  then  again, 
With  tremulous  cadence  slow,  and  bring 
The  eternal  note  of  sadness  in. 

Sadness,  however,  is  not  the  characteristic  of  the 
sea  at  Dover,  nor  of  the  white  cliffs,  battlemented 
and  crowned  with  their  castle,  still  alive.  They 
change  colour  and  aspect  daily  and  nightly,  with  an 
uncertainty  that  is  full  of  surprise  and  delight. 
And  the  place,  the  streets,  the  people,  is  there  not 
some  pleasant  suggestion  of  France,  not  only  in  the 
Calais  and  Ostend  boats,  persevering  travellers  to 
and  fro,  but  in  the  actual  aspect  of  things  .?  The 
streets  are  good  to  walk  in,  especially  at  night. 
352 


Dover  Cliffs. 

They  are  dimly  lighted,  and  they  have  an  old  aspect, 
some  of  them  are  dark  and  narrow,  and  all  wind  to 
and  fro,  and  some  cHmb  the  hill  or  disappear  under 
archways  or  come  out  unexpectedly  upon  the 
docks,  or  upon  the  sea-front.  From  the  sea-front 
you  see  the  crude  Hne  of  window-lights  in  the 
barrack  on  the  Western  ClifF,  and  on  the  East  Cliff 
nothing  but  a  leash  of  lights,  dropping  down  from 
the  Castle  like  the  tail  of  a  comet.  The  people 
walk  at  nights,  in  the  wandering  friendly  way  of 
most  sea-towns,  up  and  down  certain  streets.  On 
market-day,  which  is  Saturday,  they  walk  up  and 
down  past  the  noisy  fish-sellers  in  the  market- 
place, sometimes  turning  down  Snargate  Street. 
On  Sunday  night,  after  church-hours,  all  the  young 
men  and  women  walk  up  and  down  on  the  sea- 
front,  or  rather  on  the  road  and  pavement  which 
keep  them  back  a  little  further  from  the  sea.  The 
Hghts  are  dim;  over  the  sea  they  seem  brighter 
as  they  come  and  go;  as  they  will  come  and  go 
all  night;  for  Dover  is  never  asleep.  That  gate 
of  England  is  always  open,  and  there  are  always 
warders  awake  at  the  gate. 

1908. 


THE    END 


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